Why can not we be satisfied that the millionaires have plenty of money?

by Ishan @ seefromthesky

According to Forbes' publicly released " The World's Billionaires 2018 ", there are 2208 people called "billionaires" with net worth over 1 billion dollars (around 110 billion yen) all over the world. Even those who have earned so much money often do not satisfy the current situation and continue to devote themselves to work for more money. Professor Michael Norton of the Harvard Business School, who is studying the relationship between happiness and wealth, analyzes the psychology of the billionaire as to why you can not be satisfied with the current situation, but why you have a lot of money I will.

Why Are not Rich People Happy With the Money They Have? - The Atlantic
https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/12/rich-people-happy-money/577231/

According to the Norton professor, human beings when determining whether or not satisfied with something of my life, to yourself, "Do yourself better than other people?" Ask yourself is unlikely to. This question is not limited to wealth, but it seems to include appearance such as height and individual charm.

However, the problem is that "it is difficult to measure a lot of really important things in life". For example, even if you think that you are a good parent, it is difficult to accurately measure "whether you are a good parent" by comparing yourself one year ago with your present self. Also, since there is no clear measure of "whether it is a good parent", it is also difficult to judge "which is a good parent" compared with the parent of the next house?

Therefore, it seems that there are many cases where we look to "easy dimension to compare" which can be quantified by human beings. Professor Norton said, "Money is a wonderful measure in that case, if you need to know if you are doing better than it is, you can easily check it, "How much is the area of ​​my house?" "I just ask myself," Do you have more houses than in the past? "And, to evaluate one's own life another person And compare it with money, that is, use your own asset as the scale that can be used for comparison most easily.

by Sharon McCutcheon

Also, it seems that it is not easy for people who have won a lot of money to leave the comparison by "money". Even if my family earns 50 million yen, if the people around me earn as much as they can, I feel that I am poor and I think I'm getting more "than I used to be It is possible that it is possible. As the goal on property continues to change constantly, it is natural to feel that "if you do not earn more" you can not earn a satisfaction if your surroundings are leveled up in the same way no matter how much you earn There is Professor Norton.

Norton Professor was announced in 2018 the beginning of paper in, and carried out a survey of 2,000 people with at least 100 million dollars (about 110 million yen) or more of the net assets, those surveyed are basically "2 ~ We need three times as much asset. " Even people with many assets were completely satisfied with their own assets and they felt that everyone should "earn more".

by Kenny Luo

Jeffrey Winters, professor of political science at Northwestern University and author of " Oligarchy " said, "Generally speaking, expenditures are associated with expenses such as housing loans, health insurance, food and children's tuition. However, most of the ultra wealthy people are using money to earn money, "he points out that ultra wealthy people are investing in investment and business to increase property.

Brooklyn Harrington, who is studying ultra wealthy financial practices at Copenhagen Business School, said that "the feeling of" going well "is to realize the childish dream of" purchasing sailboats and something " It is not a feeling obtained in "The wealthy feelings are obtained from the difference with others who compare themselves, so the problem is not what the individual wishes to buy but must buy to maintain its own position There is a thing that feels like "I do not satisfy the satisfaction of the ultra wealthy people as to what I bought but it is more advantageous if I buy anything compared to a person at a level similar to myself It is pointed out that it is the one that fulfills the hearts of ultra wealthy people.

In addition, novelist Gary Steingart also spends his experiences on what kind of ideas the ultra wealthy people have about their wealth. The hero of the novel " Lake Success " published by Mr. Steinhart in September, 2018 is a financial company working in New York. Therefore, in order to write a novel, Mr. Steinhart said that he met a dozen very wealthy investors and investigated their lives. As a result, everyone of wealthy investors seems to have hired financiers to increase their own assets, "They had more money than you could purchase everything you needed. And what they can buy was not expensive compared to what they have, Tesla Gullwing or the latest Tesla.I did not know how much they were, I think that it is not enough for 100 million dollars (about 11 billion yen), "he talks about how many investors the investors covered himself.

Investors interviewed by Mr. Steinhart said that "everyone was" fiercely competitive ". "They competed against each other at the Bloomberg terminal all day and then played more competitive poker," Steingart said, strange spirit ranging from play poker to charity donation It was said that it was reflected in every aspect. According to Steinhart, "I am analyzing the psychology of wealthy investors," In this competitive spirit, it may be necessary to look smart and more competent than my friends. "

by Steven Lelham

In addition, Mr. Steinhart revealed that the hedge fund witnessed using assets as a scorecard, using the psychology of "superhuman comparison" explained by Professor Norton and Harrington.

Mr. Steinhart said, "I'm glad that this survey was over, because it was pretty depressing," the survey on happiness and wealth was not hard and spiritually pleasant than I imagined I am doing.