At what annual salary does money stop making us happier?
Around $75,000 a year.
“…money might bring you some happiness, but beyond that magic point, any additional income isn’t going to make you happier,” said Scollon. That magic point has, apparently, been deduced as approximately 75,000 USD a year, she added, citing a recent study by two Princeton University researchers who looked at the data of approximately 450,000 Americans. What they found was that as income increased, emotional well-being also went up, but the line flattened out from the $75,000 mark.
“Perhaps $75,000 is a threshold beyond which further increases in income no longer improve individuals’ ability to do what matters most to their emotional well-being,” the study reported. This means that people in the US who make $75,000 a year (around 8,000 SGD per month) are just as happy as those who make $150,000. Any higher income is not going to increase emotional well-being, but a lower income is associated with less emotional well-being, Scollon explained.
Source: Knowledge@SMU
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Eric Barker is the author of Barking Up The Wrong Tree, a Wall Street Journal bestseller, and Plays Well With Others, a USA Today bestseller. Over 500,000 people have subscribed to his newsletter. More about Eric
