Money Buys Happiness
I was recently forwarded a CNN article (http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/04/07/bregman.money/index.html - Commentary: Don't confuse money with happiness) from a good friend of mine, Matthew C. Devlin. There are some parallels in both Matt's life and mine to the article. For better or worse, we were too young to ride the dot-com wave and entered the arena after the collapse, with several aftershocks going on around us. There were four of us who moved to California that autumn. Several other friends later migrated to southern California as well.
We never had it easy, and the struggle kept us lean. We didn't get the millions in venture capital; we didn't even try to get that VC money. We lived on a tight budget. Matt discovered how to buy 10 frozen pizzas for a few dollars at a shop near Echo Park in Los Angeles. When money did come in, it was often wasted. Los Angeles is an exciting city, and when the cash is burning a hole in your pocket it's easy to find ways to throw it away. The Hollywood night life gave us brief stints of pleasure outside of our respective apartments. We went through a series of ups and downs like everybody else in the world.
Because of that, I feel extremely well prepared to weather the current economic situation. All of us in that group that made the move west years ago are currently employed and standing on our own. For the most part, I believe we're all happy too. The reason might have something to do with the lack of huge bad debt. Mortgages for one. I don't think any of us are amongst the group of millions of Americans that have accumulated tens of thousands in credit card debt.
We went through our credit card maxing days making a go of things out west, and learned a lot about money and ourselves from it.
I would say money does buy happiness only because money keeps the vultures at bay. I am quite happy knowing that if I lose my job, I don't have an enormity of debt that will take out my 401k (which, by the way, I only started a year ago) or prevent me from continuing to live my life.
I know I am not going to retire by 30, but I also know I am not going to go bankrupt by 30 or need goverment assistance. Money, both lack there of and having it, has bought a level of freedom and independence that makes me happy and extremely fortunate.