Recalibrating happiness

[G]rowing wealth also causes people to recalibrate their language and how they should respond to questions about their happiness. If happiness itself is subject to framing effects, surely talk about happiness is subject to framing effects as well (if anything it could be easier to recalibrate your language than to recalibrate your happiness expectations). The wealthy develop higher standards for reporting when they are “happy” or “very happy.” If you are a millionaire living next door to a billionaire, you might be less likely to report that you are ecstatically well-off even though your day to day existence is pretty sweet. The failure to issue a totally glowing report does not mean that you spend your entire time envying the billionaire or suffering because of your somewhat lower relative status; you still can lord it over plenty of other people, if you do desire. In the meantime, the presence of your neighbor may be creating higher standards for how you use the terms “happy” or “very happy.”

That means even a constant level of reported happiness implies growing real happiness over time, because the “happy” word is taking on more ambitious meanings as society accumulates more wealth and richer experiences. Life improvements do usually make us happier, while both our expectations for happiness and our reporting standards for “being happy” — our use of language — adjust upwards.

From https://medium.com/stubborn-attachments/stubborn-attachments-full-text-8fc946b694d