Maybe Money Does Buy Happiness After All Analysis

In the article “Maybe money does buy happiness after all” David Leonhardt (2008) argues that money is a major factor that contributes in the happiness of most of the people. David Leonhardt is the current editor of a New York Times website which involves politics. He was previously the paper’s Washington bureau chief and as an economic columnist, he wrote an e-book about economic growth “Here’s the Deal: How Washington Can Solve the Deficit and Spur Growth”, He also won a Pulitzer award for one of his commentaries. In addition, he had studied applied mathematics in Yale University (NY Times, n.d.). According to the information that we know about the author, it occurs to me that he does not have enough knowledge to write about this particular
The author begins by talking about the Easterlin Paradox which is made by the economist Richard Easterlin which argues that having money does not lead into happiness. In fact, Leonhardt interviewed Daniel Kahneman who is the winner of 2002 Nobel Prize and he agrees with the Easterlin Paradox as well. On the other hand, Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers who are two young economists from the University of Pennsylvania agree with the author but they think that there are other factors that contribute to happiness. Furthermore, Leonhardt interviewed Easterlin who stated that people in rich countries are more satisfied in the poor ones but he argued that there are other factors that influenced their happiness other than money; because there are individuals in rich countries who are not satisfied with their lives. The author concludes his argument by stating that he believes that money can drastically affect people’s
In fact, according to Co-author Dr. Danilo Garcia who is a researcher at the Sahlgrenska Academy's Centre for Ethics, Law and Mental Health, said, “It's relationships that are most important, not material things, and this is in line with other findings in happiness research” (Dailymail, 2013, para. 4) One of the main reasons of happiness depends on the experiences we had in our lives and on our relationship with friends and families. In fact, I have conducted an online survey where I asked some questions about this matter and one of these questions was (Is money the main factor of happiness?) The result of that question was interesting. Actually, 53 out of 76 which are 69.74 percent answered no; and some of them stated that there many other factors that contribute in making people happier other than money but the most important one is having a good relationship with your friends and family and the experiences that you live with them (Azzuni, 2016). Furthermore, according to Tom Stafford, “One study famously found that people who had big wins on the lottery ended up no happier than those who had bought tickets but didn't win. It seems that as long as you can afford to avoid the basic miseries of life, having loads of spare cash doesn't make you very much happier than having very little” (BBC, 2013,para 2) This study proves the point that you can get happiness by