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The Hedonic Treadmill - or can Money Buy Happiness?

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  • 06-06-2015 4:37pm
    #1
    myshirt
    Registered Users Posts: 5,245 ✭✭✭


    A young John Lennon, asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, replied that he wanted to be 'happy'. The teacher said 'You don't understand the question John'. John replied, You don't understand life '

    Now, earlier in this week we had a thread on how content people were with their lives, and one particular poster pushed the idea that his earning potential was his greatest asset. Others said their family and friends.

    Who is right? Is one person just money hungry and totally off the mark? Or is everyone else just not ambitious enough and too fanciful in their thinking?

    Evidence would show yes that the difference between income of €10k and 50k is huge on your life, but is the difference between 50k and 500k as dramatic?

    I have said it to my friend here who has disagreed with me and challenged me along the following lines :
    Money can buy women and sex. And myshirt, have you ever seen a sad man getting a BJ?

    What do you think Ah, can money buy happiness?


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    #2
    Buzz Meeks
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 127 ✭✭Buzz Meeks


    If you become really rich and successful people will attribute deep, abstract, profound quotes to you when you were an infant


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    #3
    myshirt
    Registered Users Posts: 5,245 ✭✭✭myshirt


    Ah he said it, or he didn't. It doesn't matter. It's the sentiment that is important for what we're talking about, the idea.


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    #4
    Buzz Meeks
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 127 ✭✭Buzz Meeks


    myshirt wrote: »
    Ah he said it, or he didn't. It doesn't matter. It's the sentiment that is important for what we're talking about, the idea.

    I don't think money can buy happiness. It can eliminate some sources of unhappiness. Your various relationships and your work and how well they're going probably determine it. And as young John instructed us - your attitude above all things.


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    #5
    ThinkProgress
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,634 ✭✭✭ThinkProgress


    You can't buy happiness, but more helps facilitate it.

    Anyone who says money is bottom of their priorities is not thinking clearly IMO.

    But putting it at the top of the list is also foolish.

    It's an important tool, but only one of a set. You need the entire set. :)


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    #6
    NachoBusiness
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,389 ✭✭✭NachoBusiness


    Don't mind Lennon. That teacher should have given him a good clip round the ear and told him to answer the bloody question.

    Maybe then he wouldn't have wrote such bollocks as:
    How can I have feeling when I don't know if it's a feeling?
    How can I feel something if I just don't know how to feel?

    That teacher's toe up his arse and he'd have known all about feelings.


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    #7
    mikom
    Closed Accounts Posts: 16,391 ✭✭✭✭mikom


    myshirt wrote: »
    A young John Lennon, asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, replied that he wanted to be 'happy'. The teacher said 'You don't understand the question John'. John replied, You don't understand life '


    "Dad could talk about peace and love out loud to the world but he could never show it to the people who supposedly meant the most to him: his wife and son.
    How can you talk about peace and love and have a family in bits and pieces - no communication, adultery, divorce?
    You can't do it, not if you're being true and honest with yourself."

    John lennon's son, Julian Lennon.


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    #8
    housetypeb
    Registered Users Posts: 1,184 ✭✭✭housetypeb


    Profound quote from some starlet. "I would rather cry in a Rolls Royce than be happy on a bicycle."


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    #9
    catallus
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,106 ✭✭✭catallus


    Money, very much like sex, or one's health, is only important when one has very little or none of it.

    Freud had the insight that the hoarding of money in modern society is as worthless as the hoarding of shít. He might have added that it is shít that can buy stuff.


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    #10
    stimpson
    Registered Users Posts: 7,815 ✭✭✭stimpson


    OP has obviously never snorted coke off a high class hookers arse.


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    #11
    holystungun9
    Registered Users Posts: 2,933 ✭✭✭holystungun9


    stimpson wrote: »
    OP has obviously never snorted coke off a high class hookers arse.

    :( i wish. Spent ages on Thursday night trying to scrap together the makings out of Mary Jane Rottencrotch's muff.


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    #12
    S.O
    Closed Accounts Posts: 397 ✭✭S.O


    If you re working in a regular 9 to 5 job, or a job doing different shiftwork, if you ask someone out, if its yes you know you re liked for who you are not how much money you have.

    If you were to win the lotto have your name + photo in the media and later ask someone out, if its yes - it be harder to know if the person is only with you for your money.

    If I was to ever win the lotto, I certainly wouldn't announce it publicly, Id keep it anonymous as best as I could.


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    #13
    UCDVet
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,894 ✭✭✭UCDVet


    Yes - it absolutely can. Income is strongly correlated with happiness....people don't want to admit this.

    I can't post a picture, but look at this. It's plain as day.
    http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/blogs/freakonomics/posts/Hap4-2.jpg

    Money gives you freedom. Freedom to do what makes you happy. For most of us, we can't make any money doing 'what we love'. I'd play video games, work out, play guitar, and travel. I'm not good enough that anyone is going to pay me to do any of those things. The only way I can make money is by doing stuff I don't really want to do. This is true for more than 99% of the world.


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    #14
    Grayson
    Registered Users Posts: 16,126 ✭✭✭✭Grayson


    UCDVet wrote: »
    Yes - it absolutely can. Income is strongly correlated with happiness....people don't want to admit this.

    I can't post a picture, but look at this. It's plain as day.
    http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/blogs/freakonomics/posts/Hap4-2.jpg

    Money gives you freedom. Freedom to do what makes you happy. For most of us, we can't make any money doing 'what we love'. I'd play video games, work out, play guitar, and travel. I'm not good enough that anyone is going to pay me to do any of those things. The only way I can make money is by doing stuff I don't really want to do. This is true for more than 99% of the world.

    To an extent that's true. However a study on lottery winners found that although everyone was delighted after winning they did eventually return to their baseline levels afterwards.

    So getting more money doesn't necessarily elate to an increase in happiness.

    However the converse is true. If you have a lack of money it can increase stress levels.


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    #15
    FluffyAngel
    Closed Accounts Posts: 518 ✭✭✭FluffyAngel


    if there was ever a thread for von bismarck its this ...


    Somebody bang the drum to wake him


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    #16
    ytpe2r5bxkn0c1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 32,688 ✭✭✭✭ytpe2r5bxkn0c1


    I like to be miserable in comfort.


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    #17
    banie01
    Registered Users Posts: 16,485 ✭✭✭✭banie01


    Freedom from financial insecurity can bring a sense of contentment that can make it a lot easier to enjoy and appreciate the happiness that comes from our social circle, our hobbies or even Myshirts BJ!.
    I.E owning your home mortgage free and having no debt allows a lot less worry about where the next pay cheque comes from or indeed goes to.

    That removes a part of everyday life that for most of us is a source of stress and worry and would allow us to better enjoy whatever or job was by eliminating the "wage slave" mindset and giving us the opportunity to relax and enjoy our recreation and family and friends.

    That said...
    my grandmother always said that Nope, money cannot buy one happiness but that she'd rather be miserable in a fur coat and a Mercedes than in 1 bed flat with a coin operated 'leccy metre.


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