<snip>how can I take this article seriously when it has "experts" spouting</snip> [that] $10,000 is surely the average [income per capita] is the average [and

<snip>how can I take this article seriously when it has "experts" spouting</snip> [that] $10,000 is surely the average [income per capita] is the average [and that] once peoples income exceeds their basic living expenses...it does not make them any happier. This seems to square well with Daniel Gilbert's work on happiness as well. $40k/year for a family of four it $10k/capita. And I think we can at least take it seriously (even if we disagree) because there really is research behind these claims. Maybe we don't like the policies that the conclusions seem to warrant, or maybe we can point to methodological flaws in that research, but dismissing the claims outright is a bit premature. So most economists worry about how taxes discourage people from working, but in fact, taxes can be encouraging people to have a less feverish pace of life and to focus more on time with friends and family rather than consumption. I don't even know how to respond to that sentence. Though the construction is a little awkward, he seems to be saying that taxes do reduce the incentive to work, but that this is a good thing, because they are inadvertently spending their time on the things that do empirically increase happiness. In other words, the proposed indirect approach of reduce taxes -> increase hours -> higher income ->increase happiness may be less effective than the proposed raise taxes -> more free time ->increase happiness. I'm not saying I agree with either one, just that it's not incoherent. the [sic] idea of a decreasing marginal utility for money is not based on any scientific research. From the article: We now have evidence that shows the extent of the difference, which is roughly that a dollar is worth 10 times more to a poor person than to a rich person whose income is 10 times higher. Remember, we're not talking about the power of a dollar to buy goods, but rather its power to buy happiness. Marginal utility certainly applies to the goods purchased, and the starving man's steak brings more happiness to him than does the CEO's.