"The Rich Are Not Who We Think They Are. And Happiness Is Not What We Think It Is, Either." by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz is a cute data-analytic 2022 book-excerpt. It begins by noting that most high-earning people – the top 0.1% who take in more than ~$1.5M/year – are not famous billionaires. They're owners of a "regional business" like an auto dealership or beverage distributor. These tend to be local quasi-monopolies that make money in a boring way.

More fascinating are Stephens-Davidowitz's comments on happiness and its sources. Getting more money helps, but only logarithmically. ("You need to keep doubling your income to get the same happiness boost.") The leading factors behind feeling good are unsurprising:

The activities that make people happiest include sex, exercise and gardening. People get a big happiness boost from being with a romantic partner or friends but not from other people, like colleagues, children or acquaintances. Weather plays only a small role in happiness, except that people get a hearty mood boost on extraordinary days, such as those above 75 degrees and sunny. People are consistently happier when they are out in nature, particularly near a body of water, particularly when the scenery is beautiful.

The data behind this are in the study "Are You Happy While You Work?" by Alex Bryson and George MacKerron. Its abstract summarizes:

Using a new data source permitting individuals to record their wellbeing via a smartphone, we explore within-person variance in individuals' wellbeing measured momentarily at random points in time. We find paid work is ranked lower than any of the other 39 activities individuals can report engaging in, with the exception of being sick in bed. Precisely how unhappy one is while working varies significantly with where you work; whether you are combining work with other activities; whether you are alone or with others; and the time of day or night you are working.

The results are in Table 3, "Happiness in Different Activities (fixed effects regression model)":

The comments for the above table observe:

In Table 3 we see how working compares to the correlations with other activities. The most pleasurable experience for individuals is love-making and intimacy, which raises individuals' happiness by roughly 14% (relative to not doing this activity). This is followed by leisure activities such as going to the theatre, going to a museum and playing sport. Paid work comes very close to the bottom of the happiness ranking. It is the second worst activity for happiness after being sick in bed, although being sick in bed has a much larger effect, reducing happiness scores by just over 20%.

Bottom lines:

• So sad to see how many people don't enjoy their Jobs!
• So surprising to see modern online media making so little difference!
• So sweet to see Nature, Art, Activity, and Connection at the top of the happy-making list!

_{(cf Optimist Creed (1999-04-16), Unenviable Happiness (2006-02-27), Pursuit of Happiness (2008-11-19), Models of Happiness (2012-01-05), Happiness Buffer (2013-12-22), Mantra - Happiness Is (2018-03-20), Happiness and Excellence (2021-11-10), ...) - ^z - 2023-09-26}