Things keep getting better—so why aren't we happier?

Most Americans, most of the time, have been getting better and better off in most aspects of life—and this has been happening for decades.  Shouldn't that be good news to our politicians, newspaper editors, and journalists?  Their silence on that subject is deafening. 

Each day, during midday exercise time, I catch up on various topics by listening to podcasts I select and download earlier in the day.  Yesterday I discovered one that's a must-listen for three types of Americans: optimists, pessimists, and fence-sitters.  Be sure to allocate 55 minutes to this listening session, because it's divided into two equally important halves:

• Why most aspects of our lives have been improving for most of us for decades, even though we don't hear much about it from our politicians and journalists; and . . .

• Why we are getting more and more unhappy—in spite of these improving conditions.

[The link to the podcast is at the very bottom of this article.]

Here's one excerpt with which I certainly cannot argue:

Institutionally, reporters, editors, and political figures just can't deal with evidence of progress—whereas they're very comfortable with scandal, corruption, claims of doomsday, etc.  There's a cohort of American life that seems to like scandal and doomsday.

That is Gregg Easterbrook talking, and the excerpt is from the first half of the interview. (Easterbrook is a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution.)  After his recent book was published—The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse—he learned that, paradoxically, "good news either scares people or makes them angry."  (I've independently observed that phenomenon, by the way.) 

The second half of the interview is just as interesting.  He mentions a relatively new development in psychology: research into the causes of happiness.  Research reveals several apparent causes, one of which is that the happiness level within different cultures is significantly higher "where honesty is highly regarded."  He points to Scandinavia as a leading example: telling a lie in that culture is regarded as scandalous and repulsive.  The high priority they place on truthfulness is one reason why Scandinavians are among the happiest people in the world.  It's not a coincidence, it's almost certainly cause-effect.  [Side note: I'd personally prefer a world in which a higher proportion of cultures and individuals held truthfulness as top priority, but my experience tells me that's wishful thinking.] 

The entire podcast interview is at this web page.  Be sure to listen to the whole thing on your computer or your iPod. 

Comments

[Ariah]

There's an excellent article by Johan Norberg that discusses the same phenomena. You can find it here:
http://www.johannorberg.net/index.asp?page=articles&articleid=143&print=yes

[pawnking]

Also, you can read the Book of Ecclesiastes if you want to know all about this paradox.

No, I'm not kidding.

[jp]

Feb Treasury statement released...12 month receipts still growing (11.3%) at more than twice the rate of expenditures (5.2%)...if trend continues, balanced budget to be reached in April 2008.

cheers
jp
http://www.americansforfreedom.blogspot.com

[Jon Thompson]

How much happier would you be if you didn't have to worry that your friends don't enjoy spending time with you, that other people don't really like your cooking, and that people didn't find you interesting? Personally, my answer is: quite a bit.