hedonic treadmill n.
The tendency for a person’s economic expectations and desires to rise at the same rate as his or her income, resulting in no net gain of satisfaction or happiness.
Example Citation:
Looking at the data from all over the world, it is clear that, instead of getting happier as they become better off, people get stuck on a “hedonic treadmill”: their expectations rise at the same pace as their incomes and the happiness they seek remains constantly just out of reach.
—John Lanchester, “Pursuing happiness,” The New Yorker, February 27, 2006
This is something I used to be massively guilty of. Now a days I seem to be finding more joy in type two style happieness – being debt free and seeing myself work towards my long term goals – and only the occasional modest type one lash out.
Truth be told, the sort of thing that really makes me happy is having my hand held by someone important. No one in that role right now, but these days I am less doubtful that this will always be the case.
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