Money doesn't make people crazy. Money lets people stop having to act sane.

anonymouse@lemmings.world to Showerthoughts@lemmy.world – 265 points –
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When people tell me 'money doesn't buy happiness', I tell them 'it removes a lot of anxiety'.

These people don't have any anxiety anymore, and believe they can do anything. Most of the time they're right.

Money doesn't buy happiness, it's merely a pre-requisite for health, safety, freedom of movement, education, and social standing.

health, safety, freedom of movement, education, and social standing

Which all contribute severely to your happiness.

Money can't buy happiness, this is true, but it sure buys a shitton of opportunities to feel happy....

Plus a bunch of stuff that was illegal when you were poor suddenly becomes perfectly legal if you're rich enough to pay the associated fees.

I mean, sure the police call them "fines"...but still.

Once your basic needs are met money can't really make you that much happier. They did a study on a bunch of people and they found that once you have all the needs met you can't buy happiness

Money doesn't buy happiness, but it does make it a helluva lot easier

If money doesn’t buy happiness all I ask for is to have to learn this hard lesson for myself.

If you are poor with outlandish ideas, you are crazy. But if you are rich, then you are eccentric, entrepreneurial, or a maverick.

True. J.K. Rowling didn't have shit to say about trans people when she was on the dole.

Maybe she had shit to say but no one would care. There are plenty of nobodies with similarly crappy opinions but no one pays them any attention.

Insofar as I recall she wasn't TERF'y until well after the books and movies. Most folks could ding her for during that time period was the goblins and some character naming.

Sure, but back then the whole issue didn’t get that much attention to begin with.

Excessive amounts of money.

Excessive is a different threshold for each person. For some, it's "so much that I've lost touch with the reality of human struggle." For others, it's "just enough so I can stop pretending I'm not a giant douche."

It's less about the specific amount and more about the comparative relation. Having a lot more money than other people fucks you up; if you're interested in the specifics, Some More News did a dive into the literature on it, and they have citations.

Yes, and for quite a few money doesn't even change anything. People are different.

People use money to avoid hard work like introspection

Do you all actually act sane or is there some nuance I don't understand?

You'd have to be mentally ill for that to be case, I think.

To clarify, are you saying that you'd have to start off with some mental illness to be able to act like you didn't have it?

Not sure if I'm stepping to a bait, but only insane people would have the need "to act sane", right?

My unproven hypothesis is that everybody's a little nuts, just maybe not clinically so.

I'm not baiting, it just seemed like you might have been trying to call someone mentally ill and i was making sure that wasn't the case.

I think you need money to meet your basic needs. When it comes to really wealth people acting crazy it is usually just media overhype. If they are crazy it earned them a lot of money

I think at some point it makes people bored. The insanity is a way to stay entertained.