Pursuing happiness in all the wrong places
A modern American pursuit
Would mustard have fit in our founders’ conception of Happiness? [1] Today, we reveal the answer, and examine a misdirected modern American pursuit of Happiness.[2]
This is the third post of four; the first post discussed the history of the pursuit of Happiness through ~1776. The second discussed progress since then, and a recent reversal of that progress. If you haven’t read them yet, I recommend starting there.
We’re releasing the fourth post, with tips for increased national happiness, next week.
We pick up where we left off: why are we becoming less happy? What can we do about it?
Why is the US becoming less happy while becoming richer?
While US personal income has increased in recent years, national happiness has been declining.
Increased personal income is associated with increased personal happiness.[3] However, among wealthy nations, increased national income might not lead to increased long-term happiness. How do we explain the seeming contradiction?
Status and accomplishment help drive the happiness gain from increased personal income.[4] Increased personal income matters more for increased happiness in nations with increasing inequality (like the United States). At the national level, this becomes a zero-sum game, however; happiness is increasing for those who are becoming wealthier, but decreasing for those left behind.
We can (and should) boost national happiness by decreasing inequality and poverty.
Addressing factors outside income also will play an essential role in boosting happiness.
What might our founders observe?
Our founders would be thrilled for a moment by how much we talk about happiness, then quickly horrified by how we talk about happiness.
Happiness is featured in many famous American songs. Ruth Whippman, a British immigrant to the US, found happiness to be an American obsession; others agree. We spend an estimated $10 billion to be happier each year, and 43% of Americans have gone into debt buying something to try to be happier.
This is the country that birthed the Happy Meal, the Happiest Place on Earth, and shoes, drinks, potato chips, ice cream, a city, TVs, personalized health care, furniture, lotion, and more promising happiness. Even mustard has gotten in on the promise. Really — mustard?
We can all celebrate a moment of happiness when enjoying a product, but as Elizabeth Dunn and our Advisory Board member Mike Norton demonstrated in Happy Money, personal product purchases are not the pathway to sustained happiness (i.e. joy).[5]
The modern explosion of consumer choice also drives more individualism — running counter to the relationships so critical for sustained happiness. And while individual purchases can deliver a brief dopamine hit, the overabundance of available dopamine hits in modern western nations may be driving increased anxiety, depression, and even suicidal ideation.
In our unequal society, a consumer-focused, individual search for happiness drags happiness down because it enables comparison (and jealousy).
Individuals can make smarter spending decisions to increase happiness (decisions that support relationships, purpose, and other joyful pillars — learn more in Happy Money). At a national level, we need to reduce the consumer focus — and look elsewhere.
Where?
This post shares research-based opportunities to improve American happiness and life satisfaction including: providing more social programming (health care, social services) for all, improving people’s health (fitness), increasing education, increasing connections to family and social support (relationships), increasing people’s sense of “freedom to make life choices” (~purpose) and increasing “trust”. Peer nations that rank higher in those areas rank happier.
The post also highlights declining religiosity (contemplation) as a factor in decreased happiness; connecting those who want to join faith communities to them, and developing better alternatives to support joy for others, can help. [6]
In other words, our 5 pillars of community joy can lead the way in increasing national joy. Our founders’ conception of happiness was much closer to what matters than is the modern individual concept.
On that founders’ note, we’ll return to the role of government and other systems in increasing national joy — in next week’s post.
Would mustard have fit in our founders’ conception of Happiness? If you missed it, the answer is no.
This is the 23rd post about boosting joy the only way we can: in community. This also is the third in a series of four posts about the pursuit of Happiness as the United States turns 247. Please share, subscribe (https://medium.com/@justinpasquariello), and join our movement by emailing me or supporting East Boston Social Centers: https://www.ebsocialcenters.org/support
[1] This post references Happiness as the Declaration of Independence did. However, their “happiness” is best translated as “(community) joy” today.
[2] I say “a” because there are many properly directed pursuits of happiness in the US too — just not at scale.
[3] The impact of that increased income is not as great as the impact of other important factors, however.
[4] The ability to meet more basic needs also increases personal happiness when incomes grows for those with low incomes.
[5] Subsequent research highlighted the happiness gains from purchasing products for oneself, but those gains are in the modern, shorter-term type of happiness: not long-term community joy.
[6] Some who don’t want to participate in organized religions have explored secular churches and other approaches to reaping some of the benefits of religion.