My brother makes 40% more in salary than I do, but he’s always struggling. Why?

My brother and I are both in our mid-30s. Our backgrounds and interests could not be more different, but one area we are the same is finances. <br><br>My brother went vocational school. I went to a university. He was a mechanic for many years, then decided to make a career change and got a job as a **field service tech** for a large corporation (e.g. their competitors would be someone like Otis Elevators, although it’s not them). That corporation pays him quite well: he makes $115,000/yr and has benefits like health insurance, a company car and gas card, phone, laptop, and a generous 401(k) matching program. <br><br>I am a software developer. I make $82,000/yr with health insurance, 401(k) matching, and a one-time RSU grant that vests in two years. <br><br>My brother has no student loan debt, as he was covered by a combination of scholarships and his parents. He has a paid-off Jeep Wrangler. (I have a paid-off Hyundai Elantra.) He is married and has a 16-year old daughter. So, that’s his family of three. I am in a long-term relationship with a partner. So, that’s two of us. <br><br>My brother and his family live in a 4-bedroom house with an additional room over the garage he uses as a “man-cave”. He has a huge backyard and he said the house is about 3300 sq ft. In all, their house is quite large, especially for what my parents call a “shack town”. Our parents live in the Northeast. My brother lives in the Midwest. <br><br>My partner and I live in a 710 sq ft apartment in the Northeast. It’s within walking distance to two grocery stores. <br><br>My brother and his family take two vacations every year. One goes for about five days and the other for about ten days. <br><br>My partner and I took one vacation last year, which lasted 3-4 days. We’re not really a “vacation” family. Neither of us grew up in families that took many vacations. We did take an extra week off around Christmas, but that was part of my firm’s “winter break” where they close their offices and shut-down for a week. We spent it with our extended family. It was a blast. <br><br>My brother’s Step 1 is to make his money. Step 2 is to spend his money. Then he runs out of money before the next pay period. This is the first time I heard this joke but my brother’s friend told it to him once. He seemed to enjoy it. If it were true, he’d be funnier than I thought. <br><br>In all seriousness, though, I do not know why my brother runs out of money. I know he spends lavishly on his family’s vacations. I get the distinct impression they do not save for their vacations at all and that these vacations are usually “fully-funded”, so to speak, from their latest paychecks. <br><br>Plus, the few times I visited his house I really did not like it at all. It’s huge, but not really lived-in. The decorations were cheap with not much thought put into them. It had a very hollow, “bachelor-pad” feel to it. I had no idea what my SIL uses her time for, as the house was always a mess in strange ways. <br><br>Example: the dishes were clean, but there was a half-empty glass of orange juice sitting on the kitchen counter. It had been there for so long it had separated and grown mold. Example: all of the toys were neatly organized in the playroom, but my niece left her dirty socks all over the house. Example: my brother kept his “man-cave” spotless. It was truly a fantastic room. Example: the walk-in closets in the master bedroom were perfect in every way. Example: the backyard has a deck, hot-tub, patio, grill (BBQ), and some foliage, and all of it was well-maintained. Example: there was a wine fridge in the kitchen with a solid collection of white wines (I’m a beer guy, but I recognized some good vintages of Chardonnay). <br><br>All in all, that house and yard were kept-up in some areas and ignored in others. <br><br>My brother’s spending habits are completely alien to me. I do not know how he’s so bad at budgeting. I do not know where his money goes. I do not know why he makes so much but struggles so much. In fact, it feels like he may actually be a spendthrift and not someone who struggles. I’m not sure. <br><br>I have tried talking to him about this, but he isn’t interested. I have tried talking to my SIL. She is also not interested. For whatever reason, I doubt they will listen to advice about saving money and budgeting.