Can Money Buy Happiness?

The Easterlin paradox shows that large amounts of growth have not led to corresponding increases in average national happiness.

Publised in Express-Tribune on July 18th, 2011

Can Money Buy Happiness?

Dr. Asad Zaman

Across time and space, in widely different cultures and religions, there is an amazing amount of consensus that the answer to this age-old question is an emphatic “No”. The legend of how the golden touch of King Midas turned his daughter to gold teaches this lesson to children. Early in the twentieth century, some influential thinkers argued that even though greed for gold was bad – a “disgusting morbidity” – it could be harnessed for a good end. Unchaining the powerful drives for accumulation of wealth would create wealth for the society as a whole, ultimately freeing man from all worldly worries. Keynes expressed this vision poetically: “… we must pretend that fair is foul and foul is fair. Avarice and usury must be our gods for a while, for only they can lead us out of the tunnel of economic necessity.”

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