<story><title>Money can buy happiness</title><url>http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2013/05/daily-chart-0?fb_ref=activity</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>leoedin</author><text>The income scale is logarithmic, so the apparently linear lines that you see are actually curved. The returns in happiness per $ earned fall off significantly towards the top of the scale (which incidentally is capped at a fairly low $128,000). I don&amp;#x27;t really see how this new data contradicts the generally accepted view (mentioned in the article) that money increases happiness up to a point.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rm999</author><text>&amp;gt;I don&amp;#x27;t really see how this new data contradicts the generally accepted view (mentioned in the article) that money increases happiness up to a point.&lt;p&gt;The article shows a logarithmic trend (i.e. doubling your income increases your happiness by a fixed amount), which is a straight line on the log plot. This insinuates (&lt;i&gt;if&lt;/i&gt; the trend continues, which is assumed from the results) that there is no point at which increased income won&amp;#x27;t make someone happier.&lt;p&gt;The traditionally-held view is that there is an income (I&amp;#x27;ve heard something like 70k in the USA) where the plot should become a horizontal line, i.e. increasing your income increases your happiness by zero.&lt;p&gt;These are very different conclusions. The plot isn&amp;#x27;t really falling &amp;quot;significantly towards the top of the scale&amp;quot;. Log is the correct way of looking at income, because people consider changes to their income proportionately to their current income (for example, a 5% raise to someone making 1M dollars a year is about as significant to his life as a 5% raise for someone making 100k, even though the actual additive amounts are very different).</text></comment>
<story><title>Money can buy happiness</title><url>http://www.economist.com/blogs/graphicdetail/2013/05/daily-chart-0?fb_ref=activity</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>leoedin</author><text>The income scale is logarithmic, so the apparently linear lines that you see are actually curved. The returns in happiness per $ earned fall off significantly towards the top of the scale (which incidentally is capped at a fairly low $128,000). I don&amp;#x27;t really see how this new data contradicts the generally accepted view (mentioned in the article) that money increases happiness up to a point.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jheriko</author><text>&amp;gt; I don&amp;#x27;t really see how this new data contradicts the generally accepted view (mentioned in the article) that money increases happiness up to a point.&lt;p&gt;It doesn&amp;#x27;t - the title of the article and the interpretation provided with in is almost as misleading. They start off quickly by telling you about the &amp;#x27;Easterlin paradox&amp;#x27; - that is what they have specifically found evidence against. i.e. &amp;#x27;more money makes you happier&amp;#x27; is backed by evidence.&lt;p&gt;The fact that more money makes you happier does not mean that any amount of money can make you as happy as you want though...&lt;p&gt;This is not surprising - its probably common sense.</text></comment>