Before I was married, I did pretty well with a decent salary and investment income. After we was married, I noted the same problem: her income was taxed at my highest marginal rate.
We maxed out everything that gives us any tax benefits: 401(k)/403(b) contributions, FSA/HSA contributions, etc. If we are under the income limit, we also make Roth IRA contributions for each of us.
This substantially reduced the tax bite. Our take-home income is about the same, but we will get a lot of additional benefits in the long run.
I realize that a part-time job typically won't allow her to make 401(k) or HSA contributions. But, she CAN make an IRA contribution (Roth or traditional). If you can invest that additional money in long-term plans without making too many sacrifices now, you'll come out ahead.
Thanks for the tip. We’re already maxed out on the HSA and my 401(k), but the IRA is something I should look into if we can swing it.
We had a bunch of one-time out-of-pocket medical expenses in 2012. I’m hoping they will hit the ridiculously high threshhold where I can deduct some of them and that will give us a little extra $ that we could put away.
Obamacare has changed(and is still ‘evolving’) what can be paid for via FSA/HSA. Careful you don’t end up with $ that ends up being forfeited back to Uncle Scam since you couldn’t use it all up.