Money doesn't buy happiness, but it removes month-end anxiety

Having enough for retirement is not the same as being happy, far from it

Having enough money to never work again does not make you happier. This assertion comes not from a self-help book, but from someone who claims to have verified it in their own bank account: money doesn't bring happiness even when there is plenty. Ten years ago, they say, having just 10% of what they have now would have made them feel like the happiest person on earth. Today, they have more than enough to retire and are no happier. They live more calmly, have food and shelter secured until death, and their standard of living has not risen at all.

This is not feigned humility. It is the most honest description of something economic theory calls the marginal utility of money: the first paycheck changes a life, the twentieth changes almost nothing. Beyond a certain point, more of the same.

How much money is needed to stop thinking about money?

The short answer is all the money one doesn't have. The long answer depends on the threshold. The most common scenario is the opposite of ample wealth: €1,200 for eight hours of work, plus two hours of subway commuting round alucinación, and shared housing with eight people. There, money doesn't buy joy, it buys an exit.

At the other extreme lies a fortune of €18 million that its owner knows they will never be able to spend. Between these two extremes, the unavoidable conclusion is uncomfortable: to stop constantly thinking about money, you need money. That is the only utility hardly anyone disputes.

The paradox arises when someone with a settled life confesses that they enter El Corte Inglés or Amazon with €1,000 in their wallet and leave with it still intact 99% of the time. The only thing that excited them that month was a €140 cream for their mother. Neither cars with 300 or 400 horsepower nor 85-inch televisions move their emotions anymore.

Money is time: the eight hours that don't return

The argument with the most traction isn't consumption, but the clock. Eight daily hours in an office are a third of anyone's productive life. If money serves to avoid selling those hours, then it buys something very similar to happiness. Some state it bluntly: "Money represents time. Time spent doing things to earn a living." And time, they add, is directly life, and it is limited.

Hence the scene proposed as an operational definition of happiness: waking up on a Wednesday without an alarm, not knowing what day it is, spending the day reading and working for pleasure, with no concern other than the book and the next day. That costs money. And hence also the most repeated formula: money doesn't give you happiness, but it leaves you plenty of free time to find it.

"Money doesn't buy happiness": who benefits from this phrase?

There is a current that directly doubts the saying. Its argument is common sense: if money didn't matter, no one would endure eight hours a day under a boss to get it. Another line goes further and argues that those repeating the mantra are lying to themselves, because describing reality hurts and it's cheaper to adorn it.

Added to this is the ideological reading: the idea that money doesn't buy happiness functions as part of the narrative justifying a model based on accumulation, and the proof would be that there are happy people without a penny, even in poor countries. The counterattack is equally sardonic: poverty is not the path to nirvana either, and those who defend the contrary have tried neither.

Onassis, the "poor rich girl" and the health argument

Historical cases are used as evidence. Barbara Hutton, who became one of the world's richest women, carried the nickname poor rich girl. Christina Onassis married twice seeking in men the figure of a father who, according to the prevailing narrative, gave her everything except attention. Neither fortune avoided unhappiness.

The issue becomes serious regarding health. Consider the same illness at age 35 treated by public healthcare or the most exclusive private center, and ask which offers better chances of survival. This comparison is launched as a suspicion, not verified data. Another intervention lowers the tone: what can be bought with money is never a real problem; real problems are others, and none are paid for by card.

Money, health, and excitement: the three-layer recipe

From this emerges the hierarchy with the most consensus: money is the base, above it goes health, and over both, excitement. And excitement, like a portfolio, should be diversified: reading, conversations, cinema, concerts, theater, eating well, some sport. If concentrated in one place, it runs out.

The ladder also explains why money yields less as the amount rises. Moving from an R5 without air conditioning or power steering to a 21st-century car satisfies much more than switching from one expensive sports car to another even more expensive one. There is also a stage-based reading: money matters little in childhood and adolescence, dominates in adulthood, and loses weight again in old age, where what it buys, when possible, is health.

One might expect the boundary between living calmly and being happy to remain just as blurry. Those with food and shelter secured say they are calmer, not happier. Those without them claim they would be ecstatic. Perhaps both are wrong.