Why does wealth bring happiness

Especially the why-nots. Why is it that the more money you have, the more you want? In attempting to answer these seemingly depressing questions, the new scholars of happiness have arrived at some insights that are, well, downright cheery.

Much of the research suggests that seeking the good life at a store is an expensive exercise in futility. The more you have, the less effective it is at bringing you joy, and that seeming paradox has long bedeviled economists. Three reasons:.

Humans are adaptable creatures, which has been a plus during assorted ice ages, plagues and wars. While earning more makes you happy in the short term, you quickly adjust to your new wealth—and everything it buys you.

Even though stuff seldom brings you the satisfaction you expect, you keep returning to the mall and the car dealership in search of more. When your new car loses its ability to make your heart go pitter-patter, he says, you tend to draw the wrong conclusions.

Instead of questioning the notion that you can buy happiness on the car lot, you begin to question your choice of car. So you pin your hopes on a new BMW, only to be disappointed again. More money can also lead to more stress. The big salary you pull in from your high-paying job may not buy you much in the way of happiness. But it can buy you a spacious house in the suburbs. Trouble is, that also means a long trip to and from work, and study after study confirms what you sense daily: even if you love your job, the little slice of everyday hell you call the commute can wear you down.

You endlessly compare yourself with the family next door. He was right. Happiness scholars have found that how you stand relative to others makes a much bigger difference in your sense of well-being than how much you make in an absolute sense. Your penchant for comparing yourself with the guy next door, like your tendency to grow bored with the things that you acquire, seems to be a deeply rooted human trait.

An inability to stay satisfied is arguably one of the key reasons prehistoric man moved out of his drafty cave and began building the civilization you now inhabit. You can afford to step off the hedonic treadmill.

The question is, how do you do it? If you want to know how to use the money you have to become happier, you need to understand just what it is that brings you happiness in the first place. Friends and family are a mighty elixir.

One secret of happiness? Innumerable studies suggest that having friends matters a great deal. Compared with the happiness-increasing powers of human connection, the power of money looks feeble indeed. So throw a party, set up regular lunch dates—whatever it takes to invest in your friendships.

Instead, it keeps increasing. Here, "income" refers to a concept known as log income ; rather than each dollar mattering the same to each person, each dollar starts to matter less the more a person earns.

In other words, proportional differences in income matter the same to everyone. Beyond that, Killingsworth's work also provides a deeper understanding of the link between income and happiness. Higher earners are happier, in part, because of an increased sense of control over life, he says. You can likely see this in the pandemic. People living paycheck to paycheck who lose their job might need to take the first available job to stay afloat, even if it's one they dislike. People with a financial cushion can wait for one that's a better fit.

Across decisions big and small, having more money gives a person more choices and a greater sense of autonomy. Yet it might be best not to define success in monetary terms, he says. I also found that people who earned more money worked longer hours and felt more pressed for time.

Though the study does show that income matters beyond a previously believed threshold, Killingsworth also doesn't want the takeaway to enforce an idea that people should focus more on the money.

In fact, he found that, in actuality, income is only a modest determinant of happiness. Follow more stories on Facebook and Twitter. A recent study published in the Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences has shown that, contrary to what people thought before, an individual's earnings and happiness have a deeper connection. But the way you view wealth and materialism may have a significant effect on how satisfied and happy you are with your life, according to a new study published in the journal Applied Research in Quality of Life.

After analyzing results from a survey of over 7, German adults for the study, researchers at the Binghamton University School of Management found that people's feelings about materialism tend to be nuanced.

Specifically, there's a difference between "happiness materialism" and "success materialism," the researchers found. Buying into "happiness materialism" — the belief that wealth is an indicator of a happy life — tends to be problematic because it takes "much time, energy and money away from other life domains that make an important and positive contribution to present life satisfaction," such as family, work and health, the study authors wrote.

However, researchers believe focusing on "success materialism" — the idea that wealth signifies success — enhances people's "economic motivation," or their drive to work and improve their standard of living. Thinking about success through that lens could make individuals more satisfied with their present lives and hopeful about the future.