The secret to happiness

[Valin]

AEI:

 

[Valin]

What Really Buys Happiness?

Not income equality, but mobility and opportunity

Arthur C. Brooks

Summer 2007

 

The United States is a rich nation getting richer. According to the U.S. Census, between 1993 and 2003 the average inflation-adjusted income in the top quintile of American earners increased 22 percent. But prosperity didnt end with the top earners: those in the middle quintile saw their incomes rise 17 percent, on average, while the bottom quintile enjoyed a 13 percent increase. This isnt a short-term phenomenon, either. In the 30 years leading up to 2003, top-quintile earners saw their real incomes increase by two-thirds, versus a quarter for those in the middle quintile and a fifth among the bottom earners.

 

Reason to celebrate? Not according to those who worry about rising income inequalitythe fact that the rich are getting richer faster than the poor are getting richer. The National Opinion Research Centers General Social Survey (GSS) indicates that in 1973, the average family in the top quintile earned about ten times what the average bottom-quintile family earned. By 2003, that difference had grown to almost 15 times.

 

Rising inequality makes for good political fodder. When I graduated from college, the average corporate CEO made 20 times what the average worker did. Today, its nearly 400 times, said Virginia senator James Webb in his response to President Bushs State of the Union address this year. In other words, it takes the average worker more than a year to make the money his or her boss makes in one day. Former North Carolina senator John Edwards, who sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004 and is seeking it again in 2008, based his first campaign almost entirely on the contention that we are two Americas, not one: one America that does the work, another America that reaps the reward.

 

(Snip)