Harvard has been running longitudinal studies for several decades:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grant_Study

and their findings lean towards good relationships with family and friends are highly correlation with happiness, health, and many aspects of financial success. The released a book summarizing many results a few years ago:

* https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/61273746-the-good-life

* https://archive.is/https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive...

> What is the shape of the relationship between money and happiness, and what are its implications?

1. money != income.

2. Zip codes.

3. Age.

4. Social class.

a) 65 year old professor living in Woodside, CA, with a net worth of $250,000K

b) 35 year old HVAC business owner living in Fresno, CA, with a net worth of $2,000,000

First is poor, second is rich, but the study conflates both into the same bucket if they both make, say, $400K/yr

Was this AI written? It seems confusing to me but I'm not an economist. I think another way to look at happiness and money is that while money doesn't necessarily buy happiness, it avoids unhappiness. So you remove a negative factor -- not having money, which is a position nobody wants to be in. This is similar to your overall health, friends, love, etc.. It's not that you need tons of them , but not having any of them is a problem, especially health.

"When you don't have any money, the problem is food. When you have money, it's sex. When you have both, it's health. If everything is simply jake, then you're frightened of death."

Every Thursday, the ice cream man comes down our street. The price is usually around ~$20 to buy happiness for a family of 4.

related: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/contra-pritchard-on-liberal...