Hi Everybody,
I'm off tomorrow for distant and sunnier parts. The case is all packed. Taxi ordered. Time to squeeze in one more episode before I go.
We finished last time with a couple opf extraordinary quotes coming out of research studies into this complex issue of money and its impact on our life state. And it is complex of course. No one study can dissolve away that complexity for us. But a whole series of studies taken together can of course give us a steer, open up a new perspective. And that's what these comparative studies do for us, and I'd like to quote just one more, to drive the point home so to speak, because it's tough for all of us to escape from the life-long conditioning that we've all undergone, namely that more money, or more of the stuff that money can buy, is just about the answer to all our problems. It isn't. So here goes;
' If you made a graph of life on both sides of the Atlantic since the end of World War 2, every line concerning money and the things that money can buy would soar upwards, a statistical monument to materialism. Inflation-adjusted income per head in Europe and the US has almost doubled in the last 35 years. Owning a small runabout was once a goal; now the average US household boasts nearly three cars, while in the UK there are now more mobile phones than there are people. Designer everything, personal electronics and other items that didn't even exist half a century ago are noe affordable. No matter how you chart the trends in earning and spending, everything is up, up, up. But if you made a chart of happiness in the same period, the lines would be as falt as the roof of an S class Mercedes. Polls in Europe and the US show remarkably little changein happiness sinc eEurope began rebuilding itself ( after WW2) and America developed into the world's unrivalled economic and military superpower. '
That's another quite remarkable statement isn't it? In fact were it not for the sheer weight of evidence, the story that it is telling seems almost inconceivable. Bu tit is given even sharper edge by the figures that are quoted in other studies. Just to explain, when these surveys are carried out the scientists get their information from a wide sample of people chosen to represent a typical cross-section of the entire population, and then those several thousand personal interviews are reduced to numbers and curves on graphs, so that the sociologists and economists can make use of them to compare results from one time and place to other totally different times and places. The American National Opinion Research Centre for example is typical in that it has been carrying out virtually the same survey since the 1950's, so that we can compare directly how people felt about their lives in the 1950's and 60's, with how they feel today.
Back in the 1950's for example, with infinitely lower levels of wealth and comfort, when Americans were asked to rate their overall satisfaction with life, they reported an average score of 7.5 out of 10. Despite the simply vast changes in the level of material wealth and personal comfort and possessions over the past 50-60 years the average score in the same survey today is just...7.2! So the simply vast increases in material wealth that have occurred in society appear not to have been matched in any way by an increase in our overall sense of well-being.
At the very least I think that kind of understanding should give us pause for thought when we try to weigh up what it is that brings meaning and purpose and fulfilment into our lives, don't you.
Right, enough for today. Next episode when I get back on 10th March.
Until then hope you have an interesting and creative time.
All my best wishes,
William
No comments:
Post a Comment