Money Doesn’t Make You Happy, But Religion, Marriage, and Good Neighbors Do (Essential Excerpts)
Startling insights about the dollar value of life choices and the dramatic implications these should have on how we parent and structure society.
Hello Bar-Setters!
My title for this is not exactly a true statement.
If you are below the poverty line, more money will likely make you happier. Honestly, a bonus or significant pay increase would probably make most people a little happier, IF they were very smart about how they used that pay increase. That’s a big if.
But, as this first excerpt shows, the effect of money on happiness is negligible compared to a lot of other choices in your life:
The Dollar Value of Lifestyle Choices
“There are quicker routes to happiness than a salary raise.
In terms of the effect on happiness, having a friend you see regularly is worth $100,000 a year.
Being in good physical health is worth an extra $400,000 a year.
Being married is also worth $100,000 a year.
Seeing your neighbour regularly is worth $60,000 a year.
Income doesn’t have a lasting increase on happiness because people usually adapt to money.
In contrast, marriage, family, and health have lasting increases on happiness and are immune to hedonic adaptation. (bolding is mine)
Compared with not attending any religious service, attending a religious service once a week has the same effect on happiness as moving from the bottom to the top quartile of the income distribution.
A poor person with a spouse, a close friend, a relationship with a neighbour, and who attends a religious service can achieve the same level of happiness as an affluent upper middle class person.
Source: Chris Williamson interpreting data from Dr. Rob Henderson
Pro tip: do not mention to your spouse that physical health is 4x more important to your happiness than your marriage…
The original source of this data comes from Dr. Rob Henderson. In it, he provides many more fascinating insights on the fuzzy link between money and happiness:
You Don’t Want More, You Want As Much
In the past, being poor meant being hungry. Today, being poor means being on food stamps.
In 1963, 20 percent of Americans lived in poverty. Today it’s 2.3 percent.
In low-income neighborhoods, the problem is not primarily economic.
I will never tire of highlighting this simple and profound finding:
Sociometric status (respect and admiration from peers) is more important for well-being than socioeconomic status… (bolding is mine)
He continues:
What Really Matters?
Today, poverty is lower than it’s ever been in the U.S. And yet happiness is falling.
A recent article in The Wall Street Journal reports, “Americans reported being less happy in 2018 than in 2008. Other wealthy countries saw similar decreases, including Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Japan...depression increased 50% between 1990-2017, with the highest increases in regions with the highest income.”
People have been making friends and getting married and forming social bonds for millennia, back when they lived on the edge of death. That’s how they survived in a dangerous world.
A recent study investigated the happiness of the Hadza (modern hunter-gatherers) compared with modern western people. The hunter-gatherers reported higher levels of happiness.
Hunter-gatherers are significantly happier than Americans, Austrians, Italians and citizens in other developed countries.
Henderson follows this logical thread to arrive at some important conclusions.
Some Important Conclusions
… Leaders have become reluctant to appeal to higher ideals or principles. The belief seems to be that all that matters is economic incentives.
In a 2019 New York Times op-ed, two Nobel laureates share research findings indicating that people overestimate the strength of economic incentives. The authors report that “status, dignity, social connections” are more powerful drivers of behavior…
We can give money to people to help them out. But we can also promote wise choices and strong norms to help them out.
The fortunate among us can share our wealth, sure. But we might also share our values—steps we have taken to live fulfilling lives. (bolding is mine)
Source: The Happiness Lottery, Dr. Rob Henderson
Parents and schools usually focus on economic metrics.
We’d do a lot better by society and our children if we focused on creating better values and norms.
Over the next few weeks, I’ll roll out a more prescriptive path to do just that…
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Thank you very much for reading and sharing with anyone who you think would find this interesting!
Carry the fire!