Can Money Buy Happiness?

Ethel Merman (famous vaudeville star early in the 20th century) famously said, "I've been rich, and I've been poor; and believe me, rich is better."

My way of putting it would be, Rich gets more points in the game of life than Poor. Many privileges are bestowed on those with money. Big contributors to theatre troupes get assigned better seats at performances, and it's the big benefactors who get invited to serve on the boards of non-profit organizations. I support a local academic/scholarly/cultural institution; but the people who pay more, for a different class of membership, are invited to special events that I do not get invited to. People who contribute more to their local PBS station get all kinds of free gifts. Etc., ad nauseam.

My mother used to put it thusly: Him what has, gets. And it's so true.

Something in me always feels that that is not fair. But then, the more mature attitude is that life is not fair.

I do, as my readers may know, tend to have sympathy for the less-advantaged, rather than the privileged. Those who are old enough may remember Pete Seeger, a folk singer. Pete was a great champion of the common man and sang union songs, anti-war songs, and so forth. He was one of my heroes (he suffered for his views because he was blacklisted during the McCarthy Era).

Present-day America is characterized by pursuit of money and possessions (of course one of the main uses of money is to acquire stuff). There are sayings like The best things in life are free. Money can't buy happiness.

A recent study that I read about tried to test whether those with more money are indeed happier. Very interesting. They said that having more money, up to a certain level ($75,000), does make one happier. I guess that "freedom from want" makes for greater happiness, and I'd certainly say that makes sense. But, according to the study, increase in wealth beyond that level does not make for greater happiness.

Then why do people do illegal and semi-legal things to gain money? Is it for the sake of privileges like the ones I mentioned above?

Update, February 25, 2012
Some further thoughts, maybe not quite on the subject of money and happiness, but still on the topic of the privileges that money gets one.
I remembered another old saying, "Money talks." It's very true. Those with wealth usually also have various kinds of power or influence, too.
It may be a matter of how you are treated in various spheres of life. I am not usually on the wealthy/influential end of things, but here's one example where I am (or was):
A lot of organizations like colleges, universities, and other non-profits that depend on contributions employ someone with the title of "Development" chair or officer or vice-president (etc.). "Development," in a world where things were more honestly labeled, would be called "kissing the asses of rich people." It's the job of these people to bring in contributions, so they interact with potential donors. On any (very rare) occasion when I might be in the position of a donor, potential or actual, I find that I can talk to these "development" people and they will jump to try to make or keep me happy--apologizing for anything I might have to gripe about, trying to fix this or that, doing what they can to appease or please or satisfy me.
Money talks.

Copyright © 2010 by Richard Stein