The true prize wealth brings
How much does it take to actually make us happy?
“There are many things money can buy, but the most valuable of all is freedom. Freedom to do what you want and to work for whom you respect.”- J. L. Collins, The Simple Path to Wealth
Many of us dream of having enough money to do whatever we want. If we want to lie on a beach for months on end, we can do that. If we want to travel the world, we can do that. If we want to keep working part-time, and pursue more leisure activities, we can do that.
In many eyes, this is what wealth can bring: freedom.
Is it true, though? It certainly has a ring of truth. If you only just get by on a meagre income, it will feel like you don’t have much freedom. You must have a job, even if you hate it. You must take orders from the boss. You may have to take two jobs and limit free time, just to make ends meet.
More wealth can give you greater options and freedom. The freedom to pick better jobs and bosses. The freedom to possibly not work at all. And more broadly, the freedom to deal with who you want and when you want to.
But is it freedom that we’re really after? I’m not so sure. Often when we talk about freedom, we really mean time. We want more money to free up our time.
We’ve all heard the saying that “time equals money;” perhaps it should be “money equals time.”
Is time what we’re really after? I’m not so sure about this either. If you look carefully at what drives our desire for more time, underlying it is the quest for greater happiness. Often, we assume more time will lead to more happiness. If we have the money, we can have the time to pursue what we desire most and that will make us happy.
That may be right, though I know plenty of retirees who have all the time in the world, and aren’t happy. Time doesn’t automatically lead to greater happiness.
Numerous academic studies bear this out. The consensus of these studies is that money increases happiness to a point, and then it plateaus. And that point isn’t that high, at around US$75,000 (A$114,000) in income a year.
This makes some sense. Once we have our basic needs covered – the bottom of Abraham Maslow’s famous hierarchy of needs – then we’re generally pretty satisfied.
And academics have found that the characteristics we possess when having less money persist with greater wealth. In other words, if you’re a twat when poor, you’ll still be a twat when rich. If you’re a friendly person when less well off, you’ll remain that way with more money.
So, underlying the concepts of freedom and time is happiness.
That leads to the obvious question: if money can’t make us happy, what can?
Through the centuries, a lot of people have searched for an answer to this.
These days, ‘self-improvement’ is all the rage. If we have a slim body, we’ll be happy. If we have a great job, that will make us happy. Or, if we get in touch with our inner feelings, that will lead us to everlasting happiness. You’ll see these things lining the shelves at your local bookstore under the heading of ‘self-improvement.’
Despite all this ‘self-improvement,’ though, it doesn’t seem like happiness is on the rise, and that’s shown in many surveys both here and overseas.
It’s easy to see why self-improvement may not be the way to go. After all, self-improvement is focused on your own needs – on the self. And typically focusing on your own needs doesn’t increase satisfaction in life.
In my experience, it’s the opposite. The happiest and wisest people that I know are more often focused on the needs of others. Helping and caring for others, with no expectations of anything in return.
That reminds me of a happiness equation I once read:
Happiness = reality - expectations.
People who help others and expect little in return can’t help but have reality exceeding their expectations.
I’ll end with an anecdote I came across a few months ago.
Steve Wozniak was one of the founders of Apple, alongside Steve Jobs. He left Apple in 1985 to pursue other things and sold all his stock around then too.
On the Reddit website in August, one commenter ridiculed Wozniak for selling the stake in Apple, which would be worth US$300 billion now, give or take: “Smart man. Great engineer. Bad decision.”
Then, Wozniak popped up to reply to the thread:
Smiles minus frowns…
Wealth bought Wozniak freedom and time, though happiness came from giving to others, and ultimately creating more smiles over frowns.
A fine motto to live by.
James Gruber is Editor at Firstlinks.
Firstlinks is a Morningstar company. If you’d like to join the conversation and contribute your thoughts, you can leave a comment on the original article here.
