Wealth and Happiness

"Money can't buy happiness," our parents always told us.

Apparently that's true for society as a whole. We are more affluent than ever, and we have luxuries that our grandparents never dream of. In the last thirty years, our homes have become larger, and they are stuffed with all kinds of devices--big screen color televisions, microwave ovens, digital cameras, personal computers, compact disc players, DVD players. But surveys show that people are not any happier. Over the last 30 years, the statistics have changed very little: Very happy, about 34%; pretty happy, about 55%; and not too happy, about 11%. Our increased wealth is just not producing increased happiness. The question, of course, is why?

In a book titled Falling Behind, Robert Frank, a Cornell University economics professor, argues that one reason may be that increasing affluence causes us to be in continuing consumption contests. People want larger homes because their friends have larger homes. They may take a second job or assume more debt to get the larger home, and that results in less leisure or more stress, or both. Moving farther out into the suburbs creates more traffic congestion and pollution, and commuting leaves us less leisure time.

It's obvious to me that larger homes and more complicated machines require more maintenance. They break, and need to be repaired. We become so accustomed to them that it is very frustrating to lose the use of them even temporarily. Again, the result is less leisure and more stress.

Robert J. Samuelson, a columnist for Newsweek and The Washington Post, believes that a major barrier to happiness today is increased econonomic insecurity. The median job tenure for men aged 45 to 54 dropped from about 13 years in 1983 to 8 years in 2006. The increased practices of outsourcing and importing labor give many people cause to worry.

On the other hand, the sources of true happiness are probably fairly constant in our lives--things like our relationships with family members and friends, the satisfaction we get from helping others, and the enjoyment we derive from our hobbies, the pleasure we get from fine music, literature, and art.

I think that a lot of happiness comes from within. Regardless of our wealth, life is going to present us with good events and bad events. It's how we deal with those events that determines our degree of happiness. Some people complain no matter how wealthy they are; others will smile through the worst of tribulations. I once mentioned to my boss on a new job that the job presented a lot of problems. He said, "Those are not problems; they are opportunities." When I have one of those days when everything goes wrong and I start to feel angry or depressed, I try to remember those words.