Why Wealth Doesn't Always Buy Happiness

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 415.

Ex. 3h) Compare these people's relationship with money. Using the words in bold from the texts describe your relations with money.

Ex. 3g) Which people do these words describe? Why?

thrifty skinflint well off hard up privileged underprivileged

Discuss how money (or the lack of it!) affects your life.

&Ex. 4a) Read the article below. What is its main idea? How is our sense of well-being connected with money? Explain what kind of studies were carried out, what were their results and what do these result mean (what conclusion do they suggest).

If the purpose of the market economy is to increase national or average income, it does a pretty job – better the most known alternatives. If the purpose is to increase people's satisfaction with their lives, the market economy does much less well.

Studies in economies show, that foe every 1,000 pound increase inincome there is, indeed, an increased sense of well-being – but only for the poorest fifth of the population. Beyond that, there is almost no increase in people's satisfaction with their lives as income levels increase. The rich are no happier than the middle classes and the upper middle class is no happier than the lower middle class. Beyond poverty or near-poverty levels of income, if money buys happiness, it buys very little and often it buys none at all.

This is strange, because market economists report that the purpose of the market is to maximize the satisfaction of human wants, but they measurethat in a circular manner: satisfaction with something is revealed by the very fact that it was bought.

Yet studies show that the things that contribute most to a sense of well-being cannot be bought, such as a good family life, friendship, work satisfaction, and satisfaction with the users of one'sleisure. There is little relation between these things and people's incomes. For many people security of income actually contributes more to measured well-being than does level of income.

Most people believe that if they had 25 per cent more income they would be much more satisfied with their lives, but those whose incomes are now at that higher level are not more satisfied with their lives. Why are we so easily deceived about something that is central to our happiness? One reason is that changes in income dobriefly influence our sense of well-being – anddecreases make us more miserable than increases make us happy. But even the happiness that comes with an increase in income does not last long, for very soon the new level of income becomes the standard against which we measure our achievements.

Many studies show that people are not good at explaining why that feel good or bad, for people useconventional explanations of the sources of well-being. And the market ideology says that source is money. According to a recent study at the University of Michigan, when people were asked what activities they enjoyed most, they ranked their actual work activities higher than anything except playing with their children and talking to friends – and much higher than watching TV. Work is a major source of life satisfaction. Of all the sources of well-being, a satisfying family life is the most important and this form of satisfaction does not vary with income except at the bottom; poverty is associated with family misery. To promote “family values”, policy should be directed to therelief of poverty.

Because satisfaction with the work one does is central to a sense of well-being, full employment should be the primary objective of economic policy.

Ex. 4b) Provide Russian equivalents and synonyms tit the following words:

average income

beyond poverty level

bottom

briefly

conventional

decrease

employment

increase

leisure

market economy

miserable

objective

relief

to contribute

to deceive

to increase

to measure

to promote

to rank

to reveal

to vary

value

wants

well-being

Ex. 5a) Charity. Answer the questions:

· Have you given money to anybody on the street recently?

· If not, do you ever give money?

· Is begging prohibited in your country?

· Do you often see people asking for money on the streets in your town or in other towns in your country?

· . What do you think is the best way to help people who ask for money on the streets?