I quote Everclear: “Anyone that says money can’t buy happiness has never had the joy of a welfare Christmas.”
I know financial distress is the #1 reason couples get divorced, and I think it’s pretty high up on the list of reasons people commit suicide too. After puting 30 seconds of thought into this I’ve reached the following conclusion:
Money does indeed increase happiness. However, after reaching a certain point the law of dimishing returns sets in and each additional dollar matters less and less.
Just thinking with some common sense, would making $1,000,000 a year make me happier? Yes, of course. Not having to worry about bills or my kids college tuition would be a huge relief. Would it make me happy? Meh…depends on the day of the week.
This has got to be one of my favourite posts from you, good job bud!
Bchad, I read your friend’s essay. Well written, and pretty much sums up my issues with the book.
yeah def
You see, this is where your argument falls flat on its face. Keynes and Krugman’s theories are supported by history and empirical evidence. The other economists you mentioned, coming from a hetrodox school, don’t believe in using evidence to support their claims.
I graduated from a red neck school in west texas, so I have no pedigree, and I can’t see why it will really matters. You appear to be the sort of person that is engaging in argument -not for the real purpose of what argument is intended to produce, but because you have an agenda and want to tell us all how important and smart you are …but what the hell:
I think it is you who may be mistaken. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that the fiscal multiplier is less than one, close to zero, and very likely negative. Deficit spending provides at best a short term boost lasting 6-9 months and then is a net drag on growth. In particular this occurs during periods of deflation following periods of extreme over indebtedness.
I think you should both study up on Fisher, although his reputation was damaged during the great depression his admission and revaluation of his theories laid the foundation for the monetarist view.
Before the comments even start about politics or Ayn Rand worship or whatever, what I’m talking about really has nothing to do with any of that, and I found Atlas Shrugged as silly and long winded as most.
If any thing Ayn Rand is interesting to me because her life was so contradictory to her philosophy of objectivism, yet she ( and many self proclaimed conservatives) seem blissfully unaware of this.
I’m of the opinion that most of her ideas were influenced or completely a product of what she experienced when she was a child (as most of us have long lasting impressions that typically form our perspectives as adults) before her family was able to escape Russia during the bolshevik revolution. Interestingly I think she supported and participated in the Kerrensky revolution (Kerrensky was a socialist) that pre-ceded Lenin’s bolshevism.
There are some ideas in Atlas that appeal to me, but as Chad’s friend articulated -that’s just fantasy. And the book is only fiction. Funny enough I think Rand subsisted on charitable gifts from family members so that she could write. As a Christian I reject the notion that compassion, charity, or self sacrifice are character flaws or sins. I would go so far as to say that these aspects of human thought and behaviour are what seperate us from the animal kingdom. As a libertarian I think that markets can actually work and work well with minimal government involvment, so called libertarians that proliferate public opinion of libertarians are more likely corpratists in my view. Anyhow, I don’t care for objectivism either as I think of myself more of a pragmatist.
You made a common mistake. The assumption is that the benefit of money is boundless, meaning that increasing ones income at any point in the distribution has the same impact. Research shows that once people can meet their needs (aka not having to worry about bills), the increase in wealth does not increase happiness. The level cited varies study from study, but its usaully in the 60-90k range.
Yep. I like to say (and thought I did so here): “Just because lack of money can impede happiness does not mean that an excess of money will create it.”
Money is a means to an end. If you don’t have a sense of what will fulfill you, having all the money in the world will still leave you unfulfilled.
Tell your friend: it’s called Romanticism dumb shit. Your friend doesn’t even know “what” he’s critiquing. This is nothing but verbal diarrhea, completely devoid of any rational thought. there are a few rational premises sprinkled in, but they are followed by logical jumps that only support his blind agenda. not one objective conclusion. complete waste of time.
Interesing article on Rand:
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/books/2009/11/how_ayn_rand_became_an_american_icon.single.html
Turd, since you are so enamoured with a logical/objective exposition of arguments,why don’t you provide such arguments that support your fascination with Rand’s ideas? Do you really think that altruism is evil? Is selfishness the only virtue? She said that the USA should be a ‘democarcy of superiors only’,with superiority defined by the rich…do you agree? Look at the people that are supporting Ayn Rand’s ideas today (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7zwO88nRH8)…do you agree with them? What do you make of the fact that right wing extremes are the core proponents behind a resurgence of Randism?..Is there a reason why Rand’s objectivism is so prevalent in the US, and not in other countries to any appreciable degree?..
These aren’t questions pulled out of my ass, these are either direct quotes from her or logical conclusions to objectivist tenets reapeated ad nauseum in her novels.
I have always felt sympathy (a sentiment that she wishess to abolish in her utopia) for Ayn Rand the woman and found bitterness in her writing (probably one of the greatest allure for me),but to me, her philosophy is some kind of self-therapy she forces upon herself to cope with the Bolshivistic trauma she must have been subjected to in her childhood. Despite being someone who expounds logic and demotes emotions to the backwaters of cognition…she always struck me as quite dreamy.
Turd, this is not an attempt to pry you away from the sacrificial altar of objectivism…but I am just curious why anyone could subscribe to that philosophy as a prescription for realty?
Alladin
The arguments that support Rand’s ideas take about 500 pages. I could answer yes to your questions, but to support them would take hundreds of pages. it boils down to the nature of reality, humans’ mode of gaining knowledge, and what this means for our requirements for survival as individuals here on earth.
Everyone on here has been using her quotes, articles about her, or works of fiction to disect her philosophy. So you are necessarily taking everything out of context. Not one of you has presented an argument against it in reference to the full exposition of her philosophy, which is Objectivism by Leonard Peikoff. As far as I can tell not one of you has read it.
This is an open invitation to anyone who wants to debate her philosophy: read the book and get back to me. One would think the people on this type of forum would value logical, critical analysis (it’s the “A” in CFA right? or am I on cat fanciers assn by mistake?), but i can just about guarantee that people on this forum of a certain world view would never touch this book because their mind would be forced to make a choice: accept her philosophy as true and valid (and accept the fact that you previously held deadly contradictions as true) or intentionally deny logic to keep safe your world view.
Surely…i thought her novels embodied her philosophy well enough to make Leonard Peikoff’s rendition of objectivism unneccessary for understanding her ideas…i may be wrong there i guess…but it’s hard to see how his book will be radically different from Rand’s novels (in terms of the philosophic tenets expounded) to change anyone’s mind…I am obviously not going to reread Fountain head/ Atlas shrugged ( that was in highscool!!)and buy Peikoff’s book just to make a point on a forum…at the moment i am much more interested in passing L3 (which i highly doubt) and finding a job that doesn’t depress me (equally unlikely)…I think we are talking at cross purposes here…I am not questioning the cold logic of her philosophy as much as the underlying premises and the inevitable conclusion that a social darwinistic mode of civilisation is someting to be aspired to…meh anyways i am done
last post from me on this issue
^too bad for you. there are excruciatingly detailed expositions of how the underlying premises – metaphysics and epistemology - lead to her philosophy of ethics, politics and esthetics. the conclusions i guarantee you are nothing close to what you think you know about her philosophy having read an article or two on the subject, or even her novels, which would be about 10,000 pages long if she had to support every action and bit of dialogue with the full context of the philosophy.
for example, if you chose to read it, you would know what is meant by “selfishness” as a virtue. first of all it would wipe out what you think the concept of selfishness means. it’s actually rational, long term self interest, which carries with it many restrictions on what selfishness actually means. this is why i hate debating with people who have not read the book. they think they understand it having read about “it”, not “it”.