Determining the Value of Wealth - Personal Statement Example

The Values of Wealth Everyone has probably dreamt of being either the richest or the most powerful person in the world, possessing something that others don’t have. Growing up, we have learned many values from schools, parents, or friends. What do people hope to accomplish in their lifetime? The answers might be so different, because everyone has their own goals and dreams. Our society is filled with people of different cultures and values. It’s important for us to adjust our attitude to the different things in our life; we need to understand the things what we can and cannot have, to understand the value of wealth and how much we need or do not need in order to bring satisfaction in our lives. When I was attending high school, I had a friend whose parents were the presidents of a global computer company. She had abundant financial support. She was not like other people who need to work and study at the same time to pay for school because their parents couldn’t afford their tuition. When everybody was taking the bus or subway to school, she had her own driver that drove her to school. She lived her life in a style that many of us cannot afford. Her parents gave her as much as they could. However, she was always unsatisfied. Everything meant nothing in her mind, even the people surrounding her. She didn’t have any friends, because she was self-centered. Everyone tried to get away from her. Then, she became very lonely. She thought that no one could understand her, even her parents. As people always say, “Money can’t buy happiness.” Even though she was wealthy, she didn’t know what the true meaning of wealth is. Scott Russell Sanders has written an essay about “Common Wealth” that addresses this concept. In the essay, he has described two people. One of them, Sam, was similar to my wealthy schoolmate in high school. He wakes up in his luxurious condo. When entering the office, the employees greet him, and he sees people have admiration with his suit, his hair cut, the authority in his stride. He only thinks about himself – his appearance, pleasure, and power. While the world decays around him, he tries to buy his way to happiness and health, as if he could withdraw inside a cocoon of money (293-94). It seems he has everything due to his wealth; however, he seems to have lost everything else that mattered in life. John is another example in Sander’s story. In contrast, he’s not wealthy like Sam, but he has a healthy life. He’s comfortable with his life, even though he’s not that wealthy financially, it’s enough for him and his family to have health and happiness. Sander has described “He lives in a small house with his wife and daughter. As he pushes the baby in her stroller toward the library, he thinks of the riches they enjoy. A bird lets loose a song, which makes the baby clap her hands and laugh, and he laughs with her. As a member of the local land trust, John played a small role in restoring this place. He’s admiring the dance of leaves and light on the prairie when he notices the baby has grown. He enjoys the joy in his daily life, the voice of bird or child, in music or book, which makes him happy” (294-97). Just like John, the well-being things around us might be the common wealth and the path to happiness for us. From a personal point of view, I was on the way home one day and I was waiting for the bus when I observed this one poverty-stricken man on the street. He begged money from people. Some people in my hometown do not have sympathy for homeless as a matter of course. However, I didn’t have sympathy for the person that I saw on the street that day. I stood in front of him and gave him some change. He was very appreciative and happy, and told me he hasn’t eaten anything for a while. After he got money, he went to the convenience store immediately to buy some food. Even though it was just a little amount for him, he still cherished it in his mind as it was the best thing anyone has ever done for him. This showed me that it doesn’t matter whether you are poor or not, if you could change your attitude, everything would be changed. The B.C. wrote an essay about the “Homeless in Prescott, Arizona” that also relates to this personal story. It’s a story about a woman who retired from legal secretary duties. She couldn’t wait for eight more years to retire, so she made a big change in her life. She moved to Prescott. She’s homeless, but she enjoys her new lifestyle and tries to use her limited money to survive. She tried to find the delight in her daily life. The library is her living room. The women’s locker room is where she performs her “toilet” and shower. She rents storage to store her stuff inside. She needs to eat inexpensively and nutritiously, because the budget is so limited (290-91). In the article it explained that she has discovered different eating experience and combined it with a new cultural evening in order to find the delight in her new life and new environment, which makes her happy with her new life, even though she has a hard time simply living. Another example I would like bring out is the middle class of our society. Middle class families are the largest portion of my country’s population. My family is also one of the middle class families. Like many families, both of my parents are working. However, their income is just sufficient enough to support our family. My parents needed to save money in order to take us traveling around the world on vacation when we were children. If we had a larger family, we might have had a hard time of getting the luxuries we had when we were younger. We feel satisfied with our position in society, even though we’re not wealthy. Unlike my classmate that came from a wealthy family mentioned before, we could not spend money as lavishly. However, with our family’s attitude with our current wealth, we believe it’s all enough for us. Some people might not feel satisfied, they want to be richer and richer. Sometimes they are unhappy, because they are not wealthy. On the other hand, compare to the lower class people, we are so lucky. The “National Museum of the Middle Class Opens in Schaumburg, IL” has said that the museum of middle class visitors found the worldview of the middle class-with its reliance on education, stable employment, and ample pensions interesting. People in the middle class earned enough money in five days to take two days off to hang out. They have enough money to live and stable employment (321). Harrison said in the essay “My parents were middle class, even though my family fell into poverty, I cherish those roots.” (322) The same situation applies to me; as I grew up, I cherish what my family has taught me, because as the middle class family, our family had an attitude that taught me that we do not need great wealth to be satisfied. My investigation seems to support the general direction most economists have taken toward questions of wealth and its relation to happiness since the mid-1970s. Richard Easterlin is known as a ‘happiness economist.’ In 1974, he developed an idea called the Easterlin Paradox. According to this idea, increases in the wealth of nations didn’t seem to have any effect on the overall happiness of its citizens. At the same time, there was a definite connection between wealth and happiness within the nations. To solve this paradox, Easterlin suggested that “only relative income matters to happiness, by virtue of its effect on status” (Syed, 2008). If everybody’s making more money, then no one is any happier than anyone else because no one is experiencing increased status along with their increased money. If only one person is making more money, then his status is increased a great deal because he has managed to do something no one else has been able to do. There are many ways that people show they have high status in their group. “In the Western world, argues Oliver James in his popular book, Affluenza, we are governed by superficial values such as how we look, how famous we are and, most importantly of all, how much money we make. In other words, the material goods that we strive so hard to obtain turn out to be irredeemably anticlimactic” (Syed, 2008). These are the values that my friend in high school judged herself and others by. She had everything and was considered the ‘princess’ because her family had all the money, but she was not happy. We think that having money will solve all of our problems because then we can buy the nice cars, wear fitted clothes, hire personal trainers and always have however much free time we could want to do whatever we want to do. The wealthy are the truly free. But the story of my friend from high school is shared by many people who have suddenly received all the money they could want and it ended up making them just as unhappy, driving one to even commit suicide (Maich, 2006). But does the absence of happiness among some rich people necessarily mean that being poor is preferable? The bum I met near the bus stop and the woman who gave up her pension in order to become homeless on the streets of Arizona suggest poverty is the key to happiness. There is much to argue for it. Living on the streets means that you have much less to be concerned about – no mortgages to keep up with, no car to stress over, no responsibilities but just the simple give and take of survival. While I never received much background on the bum, other stories have shown that it is the giving up of money and the concerns that go with it that leads to happiness. “They found that the greatest happiness was achieved by those who give away the highest proportion of their wealth. The ability to give money away is a luxury that many of us aspire to, at least as much as the bigger house or the luxury car” (Maitch, 2008). Yet, many people who seem happy have never had money to give away and people who are wealthy and do give money away don’t always automatically receive happiness. Plus, people who are poor cannot take care of their most basic needs, which would certainly lead to unhappiness as they lose their health and their ability to enjoy life and have to be always concerned with meeting future needs. “Virtually every study ever done on money and happiness has noted that wealth produces diminishing returns. Once we get to a point where we can afford our bills, and some basic pleasures without undue financial hardship, the effect of more money on our state of mind begins to fall off” (Maich, 2006). The experts agree with my findings that the middle income road is the best road to pursue if one wants to be happy. But further study has suggested that perhaps money shouldn’t be the only thing considered. Before anyone runs out and donates all their money to charity in order to live on the street, they should understand that it isn’t wealth that makes us happy or unhappy. According to Viktor Frankl, “Happiness cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself” (cited in Syed, 2008). This explains why some people would suggest that giving away money was the means of finding happiness. When people are dedicated to another idea or goal beyond the wealth, such as feeding the hungry, then they always have something to reach for. Their happiness depends on smaller victories, like starting up a new food kitchen, because they know hunger will not stop, and money has almost nothing to do with their feeling of importance to others. This doesn’t exactly explain why the lack of money throughout a lifetime might produce a happy individual or why other people who are involved in charity work aren’t happier. The reason is suggested, though. The feeling of importance and acceptance we get as a result of greater wealth, as well as the affirmation that something we are doing is ‘right’, improves our sense of fulfillment and well-being. But it is our underlying sense of well-being and the values we hold within us that determines whether or not we will be happy. The connection between wealth and happiness has another side, though. Only the earlier studies continue to insist that there is no difference in happiness whether one has money or does not. One study in 1978 discovered that people who won the lottery and people who had been the victims of violent accidents were basically the same level of happy after the event as they had been before (Maich, 2006). More recent studies have shown that many people with wealth are actually much happier than others without it, though. These studies are based on more reliable sources of information because they all asked the same questions, used the same scales and were given across nations. Nations that were poorer scored lower in happiness than nations that were wealthier and people who were poorer inside these nations scored lower in happiness than people who were wealthier. Other studies were conducted to find out why rich people were generally happier overall than poor people. “Frank’s evidence shows rich people tend to be happier because they can afford to avoid and eliminate the things that cause stress, anxiety and depression. For most people, happiness comes from devoting less energy to chores and burdens, and replacing them with more meaningful and rewarding pursuits – family, friends, exercise, travel and other ‘restorative activities’” (Maich, 2006). This finally begins to answer the question of why so many people confuse gaining wealth with gaining happiness. Based upon the research, money does not buy happiness. What it does buy is the ability to make choices. The woman who gave up her job to become homeless was happy because she no longer had anyone telling her what to do, when to go places and when she might take some time off. The people who blamed lottery winnings for ruining their lives were unhappy because they allowed the consumer culture tell them what to waste their money on rather than opting to invest it in something more beneficial. “Money is inextricably linked with happiness because money provides freedom and power. What we do with that freedom and power is all about our personal values” (Maich, 2008). To sum up, the values of getting and spending do depend on different people with different family backgrounds. There are many different kinds of people in society. Also, there are different classes distinguished in our society. Not everyone has the same spending ability as everyone else. The people who are in the lower and middle class are usually not able to buy something that we want, we need to adjust our attitude of life to satisfy ourselves. Otherwise, we would never be satisfied with the conditions we have now. The people who are in the upper class, even though they are wealthy, it’s hard for them to fulfill their goal and life spending. It’s important for us to measure the right values in our daily life, to understand the value of wealth and how much we need or do not need in order to bring satisfaction in our lives. It’s also important for us to remember the real value of wealth – its ability to grant us the power of choice. Keeping this in mind, we are more likely to watch for places where a simple choice – taking a lower paid position at work that lets us work from home for example – may bring about a feeling of wealth without the reality. No matter who we are. Works Cited Maich, Steve. “Money Really Can Buy Happiness: Religion and literature warns about its evils, but the research proves the opposite: the more you have, the happier you are.” MacLean’s. February 13, 2006. Maich, Steve. “It’s Official: Money Buys Happiness: Money is Freedom. What you do with it is up to you.” MacLean’s. May 5, 2008. Syed, Matthew. “Is that all there is?” Times of London. March 21, 2008. Read More

Sander has described “He lives in a small house with his wife and daughter. As he pushes the baby in her stroller toward the library, he thinks of the riches they enjoy. A bird lets loose a song, which makes the baby clap her hands and laugh, and he laughs with her. As a member of the local land trust, John played a small role in restoring this place. He’s admiring the dance of leaves and light on the prairie when he notices the baby has grown. He enjoys the joy in his daily life, the voice of bird or child, in music or book, which makes him happy” (294-97).

Just like John, the well-being things around us might be the common wealth and the path to happiness for us. From a personal point of view, I was on the way home one day and I was waiting for the bus when I observed this one poverty-stricken man on the street. He begged money from people. Some people in my hometown do not have sympathy for homeless as a matter of course. However, I didn’t have sympathy for the person that I saw on the street that day. I stood in front of him and gave him some change.

He was very appreciative and happy, and told me he hasn’t eaten anything for a while. After he got money, he went to the convenience store immediately to buy some food. Even though it was just a little amount for him, he still cherished it in his mind as it was the best thing anyone has ever done for him. This showed me that it doesn’t matter whether you are poor or not, if you could change your attitude, everything would be changed. The B.C. wrote an essay about the “Homeless in Prescott, Arizona” that also relates to this personal story.

It’s a story about a woman who retired from legal secretary duties. She couldn’t wait for eight more years to retire, so she made a big change in her life. She moved to Prescott. She’s homeless, but she enjoys her new lifestyle and tries to use her limited money to survive. She tried to find the delight in her daily life. The library is her living room. The women’s locker room is where she performs her “toilet” and shower. She rents storage to store her stuff inside.

She needs to eat inexpensively and nutritiously, because the budget is so limited (290-91). In the article it explained that she has discovered different eating experience and combined it with a new cultural evening in order to find the delight in her new life and new environment, which makes her happy with her new life, even though she has a hard time simply living. Another example I would like bring out is the middle class of our society. Middle class families are the largest portion of my country’s population.

My family is also one of the middle class families. Like many families, both of my parents are working. However, their income is just sufficient enough to support our family. My parents needed to save money in order to take us traveling around the world on vacation when we were children. If we had a larger family, we might have had a hard time of getting the luxuries we had when we were younger. We feel satisfied with our position in society, even though we’re not wealthy. Unlike my classmate that came from a wealthy family mentioned before, we could not spend money as lavishly.

However, with our family’s attitude with our current wealth, we believe it’s all enough for us. Some people might not feel satisfied, they want to be richer and richer. Sometimes they are unhappy, because they are not wealthy. On the other hand, compare to the lower class people, we are so lucky. The “National Museum of the Middle Class Opens in Schaumburg, IL” has said that the museum of middle class visitors found the worldview of the middle class-with its reliance on education, stable employment, and ample pensions interesting.

People in the middle class earned enough money in five days to take two days off to hang out. They have enough money to live and stable employment (321). Harrison said in the essay “My parents were middle class, even though my family fell into poverty, I cherish those roots.

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