Almost everyone wants to become rich. However, as the saying goes, money does not buy happiness. Think back to your youth, your adolescence, your twenties, when you lived with very little... Honestly, do you feel happier today? Unless we have been through a particularly troubled period in the past, most of us - well, I'm speaking on behalf of generations - X And Y, we do not feel happier today than we did when we were young. And when I say happier, it is an understatement... For the baby boomers It's a little different, and we'll see why very quickly.
What could explain this drop in morale among the troops as they age? Just getting older? Not really. In fact, there is a pretty crazy thing that will enlighten us on this point: the happiness curveFrom the age of 20, the satisfaction curve descends to reach its lowest level between 45 and 50 years old, then, from the age of 50, it rises again to reach its highest level between 65 and 70 years old.
By the time you are in your forties, your income has already had time to grow. It is also the age when your career takes off, when you are in the prime of adulthood, but still handsome and young, and also when you reach high-ranking positions. It is also at this time that you consume the most, when you buy a nice sports car or a house. Working, earning a lot of money and spending it is apparently not enough to make people happy, quite the contrary.
We live in a crazy society, let's face it. Advertising praises brands on TV and creates needs everywhere and constantly. Twenty years ago, no one had a cell phone. Today, if you don't have one, you're considered an alien. And I'm not even talking about smartphones. But is all this really necessary? Does it help you live better? You're constantly disturbed wherever you go. You're bombarded with emails all day long. Everything is urgent. The boundaries between private and professional life are increasingly blurred. To buy all these brands, you have to work harder and harder, faster and faster. Promotions, the addition of new responsibilities, lead to increased stress. Your children also want brands, you can't deprive them of that! No way.
Morning and evening, we squeeze our cars through traffic jams or walk along train and subway platforms to go to work. How could we be "very satisfied" with our lives in this situation! In our society, repetitive and poorly paid work is perceived as a rare commodity that we do not want to lose! Chaplin's "Modern Times" is not so far away...
When I told you that everyone wants to become rich... Do you think it's worth it? Let's go back to our happiness curve. Between the ages of 50 and 60, the level of happiness rises. The fifties thus announce happy tomorrows. Better, provided you have a decent level of health, Retired people are just as, if not happier than those in their twenties! Can we therefore think that there is a correlation between retirement and the rise of the curve?!? Could work be responsible for all this junk?!?
Quebecer Serge Mongeau, author of the book Voluntary simplicity more than ever wrote:
"For my part, I discovered a long time ago that the "system" - the consumer society in which I live - locks us, individually, in a cage that leaves us less and less real choice and real freedom. The fact that the bars of the cage are gilded does not change the reality of the profound alienation of its prisoners."
or even:
"Happiness is now perceived as the satisfaction not only of all needs, but also of tastes and even wishes. Satisfaction becomes saturation. But this gorging is not a source of fulfillment, because the nature of consumer society is to constantly offer new goods (or new presentations of the old), to arouse new "needs", to stir up desires. People must never be satisfied."
Our society is obsessed with work (production) and consumption and not focused enough on the real needs of human beings: have free time, time for yourself and for your loved ones, not wasting time on business trips or long working weeks, taking the time to live rather than consume.
If becoming rich is a goal in itself and/or if work only serves to cover futile consumption needs, it is the surest path to disappointments. The happiness curve tells us that when we have succeeded in life in building up a certain amount of wealth, while freeing ourselves from work and the need to consume, we become happier beings. And there is no need to wait for retirement for that.
Sources: http://www.insee.fr/fr/ffc/docs_ffc/ref/FPORSOC08n.PDF http://www.agoravox.fr/actualites/societe/article/l-etonnante-courbe-du-bonheur-46962 http://www.lapresse.ca/debats/chroniques/lysiane-gagnon/200902/05/01-824347-la-courbe-du-bonheur.phpDiscover more from dividendes
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There are unfortunately too many people who dream of being rich simply for a question of futile consumption and desire. But if for someone having a lot of money allows them to be financially secure without falling into the vicious circle of consumption, I really don't see what's wrong with that.
Being financially wealthy certainly allows you to work less if that is what you want. If we rely on the happiness curve, working less would be synonymous with greater happiness. Or, is this curve not rather showing us that too many people do not like their work? There is nothing worse than working for money. I prefer to make money work for me.
By the way, I love Serge Mongeau's books!
"There is nothing worse than working for money. I prefer to make money work for me."
Very well said 😉
Hello Jérôme and Pierre-Olivier,
I totally agree with this quote: “There is nothing worse than working for money.”
I did it for a while and I won't do it again. I actually have an article coming out tomorrow on this topic.
Good day
We look forward to reading it Phil 😉
Sorry, I didn't answer the survey, as I'm 52. I recommend reading the book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad" by Kiyosaki. Income is classified into 4 categories "ESBI": Employee/Self-Imployed/Business/Investor". Jerome, if you want, I can send you the pdf by private email (English version).
Hello Yves, no problem with the survey.
I already know this book, but thanks for the suggestion!
Hello, not being able to leave you a comment on "the financial diary of a y" that I follow closely and for which I congratulate you, I allow myself to ask you a question because I have difficulty understanding, even if I do not know your initial capital invested in the stock market nor the amount that you manage to save and invest monthly, how you hope to become a millionaire so soon or even an annuitant with the performance of your portfolio that you announce of -19% in 2008 20% in 2009 13% in 2010 2% in 2011. Do not think for a moment that I consider these performances mediocre, quite the contrary. On the other hand, they seem insufficient to me to achieve such an objective. Can you please enlighten me? Thank you in advance.
Making the right choices during your professional career, defining your priorities (family, relationships, etc.) and using money as a means of well-being, that's what is essential for me.
Yes, you said it: money is a means, not an end in itself 😉
Jerome,
Your illustration of the “acid house” smiley actually reminds me of happy times!!!
so there are two of us 😉
It is obvious that the vast majority of us are alienated from the system.
Happiness is never found by running away, it is present in us, often very buried, but very much there. We can only find it by working on ourselves.
To believe that money can contribute to happiness is an absolute delusion. Money is at best a bandage for a few wounds, but in no way a means to happiness.
Of course, you need to have a minimum of means to live and take care of yourself. But once these minimum means are acquired, the rest is useless to access happiness.
My advice will therefore be: “flourish yourself, concentrate on your real and natural needs and never run after fortune”
Well said Thierry!
I'm surprised to see that the forties are so low, but thinking about it it goes without saying (metro-work-sleep).
me not, I'm right in the middle of this mess 😉
It's the famous rat race, and it's not easy to get out of it.
Money doesn't buy happiness, but it does contribute to it...
By that I mean, as some have already commented, you need a minimum to be able to live properly too...
In the end, the ideal is to find your balance and know what will make us happy.
I too thought quarantine was great but right now it's a mess.
that for the chaos, it's chaos 😉 !!!