A better life does not always make us happier. Higher aspirations can enrich our lives while leaving us less satisfied

Niclas Berggren, economist, Prague University of Economics and Business 

Imagine a country that makes higher education accessible to a larger share of the population. Suppose that graduates secure better jobs, earn higher incomes, and gain access to richer cultural, social and intellectual lives. At the same time, they may develop higher expectations of their careers, their leisure time, and themselves. If we then ask them how satisfied they are with their lives, they may report the same level of satisfaction as before the reform, or even less. Does that mean education has harmed them?

It is similar to what may happen when someone gets a pay raise. At first, it usually brings happiness. After a while, however, people become accustomed to their higher income and adjust their standards accordingly. More expensive holidays, better restaurants, or a larger apartment gradually cease to feel like luxuries and instead become the new normal.

This mechanism was already described by the philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer, who viewed human life as a never-ending process of striving. Satisfaction is often temporary. Once a desire has been met, it is soon replaced by another. A modern economist would say that our reference level continuously adjusts.

I would compare it to running on a treadmill: people move forward, but their expectations move forward with them. And it is not only about money. The same may apply to education, career advancement, or social status.

The American economist Frank Knight took this idea a step further. He argued that people do not merely strive to satisfy a fixed number of wants. They can also cultivate what he called “more, and better wants”. Through education, practice, and experience, they develop new capacities, projects, and standards that change what they are able to appreciate and pursue.

Consider someone who becomes interested in philosophy. At first, the ideas of the great philosophers may seem difficult to understand, and studying them requires both time and effort. Gradually, however, that person develops an increasingly natural ability to recognize meanings and connections that had previously gone unnoticed. Similar growth can occur in almost any field or activity, including physical exercise and sports.

This matters because even if pursuing goals and desires does not necessarily make us happier, it provides us with valuable experiences and capabilities that enrich and diversify our lives. In other words, life can genuinely become better according to a broader standard of value while not necessarily feeling happier.

It is worth remembering this when someone points to measures of subjective well-being, which have become increasingly popular in the evaluation of public policy. It is certainly sensible not to focus exclusively on economic indicators such as wages, employment, or GDP. Self-reported happiness and life satisfaction provide valuable information that conventional economic measures can miss. The difficulty arises when these measures are treated as a complete account of whether people’s lives have improved.

A stagnation or even decline in reported satisfaction can therefore signify two very different things. Either a person’s living conditions have genuinely deteriorated, or they may have acquired new abilities, opportunities, and ambitions that they have not yet managed to fulfil. A simple life-satisfaction scale cannot tell us which of these explanations applies.

For this reason, it is not enough to ask whether people feel happier or more satisfied after a particular reform. If we are to understand the effects properly, we need to ask additional questions and frame them differently. For example, what level of income do people regard as sufficient? What do they consider professional success? Have they acquired new abilities and opportunities? Do they experience greater meaning, purpose, or autonomy? Have their standards changed along with their circumstances?

If satisfaction were the sole objective, the practical advice might appear simple: keep expectations low. A person with few ambitions may indeed be content. Yet low aspirations can also reflect restricted opportunities, while high aspirations can accompany learning, capability, autonomy, and purpose.

Contentment and human development do not always move together. A sound evaluation of public policy should therefore ask both how people feel and what their lives enable them to do and become.

The commentary was prepared based on the findings of the study Happiness, higher wants, and policy evaluation.