Money probably can buy you happiness

DG says:

09:27am | 04/02/10

Money can’t buy happiness - it can buy things that make you happy and even then the happiness is derived from either the acquisition of the thing or the subsequent use of the thing.

Essentially happiness is the human response to positive stimuli, where positive is in the opinion of the recipient. If you have money you have the potential to acquire more positive stimuli. Alternatively, if you are poor, recently divorced and living in a shoebox positive stimuli may well be hard to come by. It is also worthy of not that negative stimuli has a longer lasting effect than positive stimuli (I understand that this was a biological mechanism that effectively causes a person to keep doing positive things to get the happy hit, and avoid negative things that have the opposite effect).

Dino says:

09:33am | 04/02/10

+1. Money won’t buy you happiness, but it will buy you a big boat so you can sail right up next to it and not know the difference. Good comment.

How about: “Money don’t get everything it’s true, what it don’t get, I can’t use” (Barrett Strong)

The Blissful Ignoramus dotcom says:

09:47am | 04/02/10

I Don’t Know why we strive to purchase status symbols.

I do know, the things we buy rarely reflect the true state of us.

Julia says:

09:58am | 04/02/10

I’ve always thought that money can’t buy happiness. But it certainly rents a nice imitation of it.

Liz says:

10:11am | 04/02/10

Alternatively get new friends and a life.

George says:

10:46am | 04/02/10

I agreee money doesn’t buy happiness, but poverty doesn’t either. Better to be rich and unhappy than por and unhappy.

Luke says:

10:49am | 04/02/10

In principal Money cannot buy happiness.  The want for material possessions comes from a need to continue to have the latest and greatest things.  There is a need for material possesions so that you can live life, but anything above that is driven by greed.  Greed is not good (despite what the movies say) and leads to selfishness, jealousy and other negative behaviours.  Greed is also never satisfied, once you have the latest car, house, watch, phone etc what next? A person is not judged by the posessions they have but the quality of the friends and family they keep.  If you think posessions will bring you happiness you will be in for a rude shock.

stealthpooch says:

11:06am | 04/02/10

Money doesn’t buy happiness per se, but it helps. 

What are the things that make me the happiest?
making and seeing art, the dog, gardening, skiing, good food and wine, and o/s travel (usually to see more art).  All of those things involve expenses, often quite a lot.  As a result it’s been a few years since I’ve been skiing, I’m slogging away at 3 jobs saving for my next overseas trip, while trying to save up for some more printing ink.  I can’t say for sure whether I’d be any happier if it took me less time to save - if I could just take off to any gallery around the world without having to worry about money; if I could go to good restaurants and be able to order anything off the wine list, not just the house wine; or if I’d be a better artist if I could buy a tube of printing ink immediately.  But I reckon it’d help.

NCG says:

11:42am | 04/02/10

The idea that money can’t buy happiness is a sentiment most often made by those who don’t have any. Frankly I enjoy the fact that little is out of reach due to a solid financial situation. I’m unsure how driving a rundown car, living in a squalid rental property and working a crappy job, just to scrape by in life,  can bring happiness….

Comments from Stealthpooch @ 1106 and Leigh @ 1111 are spot on in my view.

Trev says:

01:00pm | 04/02/10

I work with a bozo who (combined with his wife) has an income of 200-230k.  Money buys them staggering amounts of ‘high class’ expensive rubbish (enormous TVs, several expensive cars).  He hates his wife (she’s as ugly as all hell and has a personality to match - just a wretched, wretched human being) and they’ve just had a child (which they buy everything imaginable for).  He spends his days drooling over any (ANY) female unfortunate enough to walk buy his ugly face (there is no embellishment in this post, none whatsoever to detail the full atrocity of this guys life would be to write a War and Peace length post).  As I understand it, money buys him the things he needs to ‘not have to deal with his wife’ - he buys holidays, cars and real estate (they are millions in debt by his own estimation).  Money is a ‘separator’ for them, if they had to deal with their own personal failings/problems they’d be divorced (simple as that).  Money may buy a level of comfort, it may buy you out of a hole but rarely have I ever seen the people who actually covet money and obtain it (as both he and his wife have) as being actually ‘happy’ people.  Money-lust seems to somehow erode ones ability to appreciate the very things that we often say ‘money can’t buy’ (like trying to achieve peace by killing people in war - one act actually negates the intended other/effect).  You can buy an expensive holiday but you can’t ‘buy’ the experience of sharing it with someone you love (unless you love prostitutes).  A round about way of saying I spend much of my time laughing at this fella’s miserable misfortunes (which, sadistically - makes me very happy indeed).

James says:

01:20pm | 04/02/10

Then why are so many of my better-off friends so angry and bitter?  And why are their wives all on Valium and Prozac?  Perhaps they spend too much time listening to marketing rubbish…

AdamC says:

03:01pm | 04/02/10

Geez, some of the comments here are ridiculous. Yes, I know of unhappy rich people – but I know of a lot more unhappy poor people!

I like money. I like earning money, spending money and (paradoxically) saving money.

Money is nice. Money is cool. Money can be exchanged for goods and services.

Money rocks.

I don’t think much about whether money makes me happy. I like money anyway. It already does enough for me.

And, you know what, I would like to have more of it. A lot more.

Bitten says:

03:05pm | 04/02/10

The fact is, some people are good at being happy. Happiness takes a great deal of personal and interpersonal insight, the ability to understand ourselves and others and to therefore identify what it is that truly makes us happy. If you are one of these people, there is no doubt that money can facilitate ongoing happiness. Whether it is used to let your parents retire early and go on a world trip, to educate your children at the institution of their choice, to ensure that the elderly neighbour who loves her garden but cannot manage it anymore has paid help to work in her garden for her, money in all of these instances can engender happiness for some people. Other people simply have no idea how to live well and indeed can barely live. These people will never be happy, no matter how much money they do or do not have.

MONEY AND/OR HAPPINESS says:

04:15pm | 04/02/10

Happiest comes from within ones own self. That is to say, you learn to adopt an attitude that can accommodate whatever circumstance is haled towards you yet still being able to hold the happiness within.  To learn this happy type of attitude takes a lot of practice.  It helps you overcome a not-so-welcomed tragedy showing up in your life and eases an event that causes great suffering and distress, such as a serious illness or accident, crime or natural catastrophe.

All this is great happiness is perfect when you have ABUNDENCE, MONEY, SECURITY and all the rest that comes with it.  The rubbish you may have been told that money doe’s not bring you happiness is B.. Sh.t.  I would much prefer to suffer a catastrophe knowing I have a huge stack of loot at my disposal.

Do not confuse the wanting of money over the worshiping of money, you’ll send yourself mad.
The wanting of money is perfectly normal I say.  Money makes the world go around and I love that.

Ross says:

05:15pm | 04/02/10

When I was working and had a dollar or two . money ment little to me as long as me and mine got some joy from it .Now I;m old and sick and poor but I still have some of the items that made me happy then and they still make me feel happy today. So yes money can make you happy if you spend it well.and don;t let the lack of it get you down.

Lisa says:

07:26pm | 04/02/10

With a significant wedding anniversary looming, to my own surprise I found I really wanted a lovely solitaire anniversary ring to replace my super el cheapo original engagement ring.
This irrational desire did not go away.
I saved up for two years, and finally got the new one.

TBH I am pretty surprised at how happy this little possession still makes me, two years after receiving it!
Every day, I enjoy my lovely anniversary jewellery, and the love I feel it represents (because my husband agreed that I should have it, and because I am wearing it on my wedding finger).

How does a woman’s enjoyment of an apparently useless gift tie in with this research?

Is my survival enhanced because I could sell the ring for groceries? Or because I feel that my status is enhanced ? Or because it becomes part of the family’s ‘stuff’? Or because the gratification was delayed?
Somebody with a fancy boat, car, or suit of clothes, please weigh in!

Matt says:

08:01pm | 04/02/10

If money can’t buy happiness then it can certainly buy a better form of unhappiness lol

As someone else has said, money can be exchanged for goods & services, and we buy the ones that make us happy if we know what we are doing. I know every time I give my car a squirt it brings a big smile to my face :D

Gerard Oosterman says:

01:40am | 05/02/10

Happiness is vastly over-rated.
I own a leghorn chicken that I have a platonic relationship with. It is a relationship that is deep and meaningful and affords me moments of contendness and inner peace. His name is Eggonot. Two years ago some jealous person stole my Eggonot .
I ended up in putting ‘lost chicken’ signs on many telegraph poles in the Inner West.
Luckily, the person who had stolen him became riddled with guilt and regret and returned my beloved Eggonot.
With his return I experienced intense moments of contendness, even happiness perhaps. 
I have become somewhat less cynical and more tolerant of people who confess they sometimes feel ‘happy’.

I feel now that there is hope for all of us.

http://oosterman.wordpress.com/

Kenny says:

07:59am | 05/02/10

good article… thanks

Hugh says:

12:39am | 06/02/10

Adam Ferrier is happy he wrote this article to stir the pot and encourage discussion and readership.
By including happiness within social settings, I think he is intelligent enough to realise that happiness from material possesions does not last.
However, Adam is confused with cause and effect eg. buying flowers does not directly result in love or affection from your partner - it mearly enhances the relationship.