£50,000-a-year can buy you happiness – after that its down to you - Telegraph

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Earning less than that amount can make you miserable – but earning more does not greatly increase enjoyment of life, it was found. Researchers found that life contentment only rose steadily with annual income up to level – $75,000, or just below £50,000. Not quite on the money, but still a decent optionOnce earnings soared above this the important things in life such as family and wellbeing made money much less significant The quality of the randomly-selected participants' everyday experiences did not improve significantly beyond a salary of £48,960.98. But as income dropped from that amount, respondents reported decreasing happiness and increasing sadness and stress, according to the findings published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The psychologists Prof Daniel Kahneman and Prof Angus Deaton explained people's life evaluations rise steadily with income but the quality of emotional daily experiences levels-off once earnings reach a certain amount. Life evaluations were measured by asking 1,000 respondents to rate their lives on a scale of zero to 10 while emotional wellbeing was measured according to experiences of certain positive and negative emotions the previous day. The data also suggested the emotional pain of unfortunate events or circumstances including disease, divorce and being alone are exacerbated by poverty. The researchers said the study does not imply people's lives will not improve after a raise in annual income from $100,000 (£64,900) to $150,000 (£97,350). But above a certain income people's emotional wellbeing is held back by other more important issues. Prof Kahneman and Prof Deaton, of Princeton University, New Jersey, said: "The question of whether 'money buys happiness' comes up frequently in discussions of subjective wellbeing in both scholarly debates and casual conversation. "More money does not necessarily buy more happiness, but less money is associated with emotional pain. "Perhaps $75,000 is a threshold beyond which further increases in income no longer improve individuals' ability to do what matters most to their emotional wellbeing such as spending time with people they like, avoiding pain and disease and enjoying leisure." They said it is also likely when income rises beyond this value the increased ability to purchase positive experiences is balanced by some negative effects. A recent psychological study suggested a possible link between high income and a reduced ability to savour small pleasures. Prof Kahneman and Prof Deaton said it was not that earning more would not make people happier just that income increases the less effect it will have compared with other factors. "What the data suggest is that above a certain level of stable income, individuals' emotional wellbeing is constrained by other factors in their temperament and life circumstances," they said.

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Indeed. Sure I've seen reports like this before; once want and limits to activity are solved by a surplus, the rest is just status, if anything.

£50k seems a bit low to me if you live in London but, apart from that, yeah, it's known stuff... In general, things that are abundant lose their value - I don't see why this wouldn't apply to money just as much as to anything else...

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yeah i saw this on the news earlier. it depends what your outgoings are, doesn't it? 50k works for me as a single girl, but if you're supporting a family it doesn't go so far.

of course champagne and designer lingerie* don't come cheap...


*primani, darling, primani.

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Yeah, £50k for a single person is alright. I think £75k would be closer to the mark. That allows for some cool vacationing abroad, which I think would have to be included in some "reaching satiety" index. It doesn't need to be first class all the way but it still is going to cost you £5k a year...

In general, I don't think converting $ to £ works for these kinds of things. In terms of lifestyle/purchasing power, I think you get a truer exchange rate by simply adopting £1 = $1. For lots of consumption items, I also think that 1 Eur = £1 works well. But, from a lifestyle pov, it breaks down a bit as so many public goods are free in Europe.

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Yep, I think I'd be able to make myself happier past £50k too. I want a boat for starters.

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