My faith in capitalism is shaken.
Part of the problem here is the actual ‘amount’ past which adding more money doesn’t make you happier. You see that amount isn’t actually nailed down - (Its not like saying give me One Million Dollars, and that’s as happy as Money can make me). More practically speaking its relative to what the peer group has.So, I talked to an actual economist. It turns out some of the things I had assumed were good ideas might not actually be good ideas. For example, I assumed the accumulation of wealth was a good idea. It turns out the studies don’t back this one up. Specifically, having a sufficient amount of money will make people happier, but beyond a relatively minimal amount, additional increases seem to have no effect on happiness whatsoever. Now, “money can’t buy happiness” is an old saying. It turns out that poverty can cause unhappiness—but once you have a certain amount of money, adding to it won’t make you happier.
Additionally, we have way more than enough wealth in the country to eliminate poverty. This would lead to a happier country. Now, some of you might object that this radical redistribution of wealth amounts to socialism. It does. But it has a worthwhile goal and a fighting chance of accomplishing it.
For the rigorous capitalists reading this, could you explain to me why expanding the pie, in itself, is a valuable national priority? It seems like wealth could be a useful tool toward some worthwhile end—but it isn’t an end in itself. What’s that end, and how do you plan to get there?
To quote an NY Times article, which is quoting one of the studies that sides with this theory : “Relative income — how much you make compared with others around you — mattered far more than absolute income, Mr. Easterlin wrote.”
Hence - the redistribution of wealth has a very small chance of eliminating unhappiness - but it does have a chance at eliminating poverty. However, who gets to decide which of those goals is a loftier one to aspire towards? So - from the above post by squashed (who I read diligently, and concur with often) is the following -
“Additionally, we have way more than enough wealth in the country to eliminate poverty. This would lead to a happier country”
Sadly - thats not true. Our happiness is much more rooted in how we’re performing compared to everyone else. To simplify the issue greatly - if you make everyone equal - you’re making everyone equally unhappy.
Incidentally - for equality - the rest of the article linked to above is about an alternate theory to the “Easterlin Paradox” which says that Absolute Income does matter.
