04-03-2012, 02:13 PM
(04-03-2012, 09:21 AM)eppie Wrote: His example the US; having a four fold increase in GDP since 1960 but no increase in the happiness index.
Country like the Netherlands and scandinavia are doing much better.
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What I wanted to do here is showing that looking at a different economic model not just based solely at increasing wealth is not such a strange thing. (the UN is actually holding a conference about this at the moment)
I tend to tune out Jeff Sachs. His arguments are seldom very convincing to me.
All of the Scandinavian and Benelux countries are really, really rich. Whatever arguments one wants to advance for the causes of happiness, wealth buys almost all of the ones that matter. This is not just true for consumer crap, but also for health, food, shelter, security, and the amelioration of social ills like poverty, crime, and inequality. All of the things we like best, even in the most equal societies, are the product of historically unprecedented levels of income. It's certainly not the whole picture, but it's most of it.
-Jester