Money. No other way to slice it. If he was an English teacher/professor raking in the dough, trust me she would consider it very "cool."

The average English teacher's salary ain't gonna support a family comfortably. Sure, it's fine as a single person, but a wife that probably wants kids and a house? And yeah, she wants those things -- this is Japan, it is what it is.

It boggles my mind that people are ok with trying to raise a family on <30K USD/year in Japan, when no way in hell they would do that back in the States.

All I can suggest to OP is get into a coding bootcamp, and hopefully in a year or so, get an entry level position. That'll probably bump him up to 4 or 5 million.