It’s better to give than to receive
March 21st, 2008 by Jim JustThe old adage “it’s better to give than to receive” is correct: spending money on others or giving to charity gives more satisfaction than buying things for yourself.
A new study published in the journal Science reports that buying stuff doesn’t make people happy. Regardless of income level, those people who spent money on others reported greater happiness, while those who spent more on themselves did not.
This result is consistent with those of other researchers around the world who have reported that reported “happiness” levels have stayed flat even though real income has surged.
The researchers found that happiness didn’t correlate with personal spending – but happiness did correlate with how much they gave away.
Professor Ruut Veenhoven, of Erasmus University in Rotterdam, said the study showed that the economic view of human motivation was incorrect.
“This may come as a surprise for economists who have learned that humans are essentially egoists.”
So why don’t people give more money away to make themselves even happier?
“Often people don’t know what really makes them happy. Doing nice things to other people isn’t so bad after all.”