The Economics of Happiness: Building Genuine Wealth

by Mark Anielski

We all know that money can’t buy you love or happiness, but we have been living our lives as though the accumulation of wealth is the key to our dreams. Why, in spite of increasing economic prosperity over the past fifty years, are many conditions of well-being in decline and rates of happiness largely unchanged since the 1950s? Why do our measures of economic progress not reflect the values that make us supportive relationships, meaningful work, a healthy environment, and our spiritual well-being? Economist Mark Anielski developed a new and practical economic model called Genuine Wealth to measure the real determinants of well-being and help redefine progress. The Economics of Happiness Anielski’s road map toward this vision of flourishing economies of well-being will resonate with individuals, communities, and governments interested in issues of sustainability and quality of life. Mark Anielski is an ecological economist and president of his family-owned corporation, which specializes in the economics of well-being.

Genres: Nonfiction, Economics, Politics, Psychology

288 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2007

Reviews

[Happyreader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lovely sentiments written by a good-hearted Canadian economist. Unfortunately, the book just didn't work for me. Too fuzzy to hold my attention.

The premise of the book is that we should be measuring wealth by how well it helps us and our communities live in concert with our values. No argument there. What I was looking for is how can our economic system be set up so that what needs to be funded gets funded, like healthcare and assistance to the poor. What I got instead were fuzzy sentiments about how true wealth is enjoying your life (perhaps that's revolutionary for economists) and a focus on creating economic indicators to measure how happy we really are.

One interesting chapter towards the end on Money and Genuine Wealth focused on what money really is but even that chapter veers into idealistic language and talks about the banker returning to a more noble role in the community.

Apparently in this new economy, there are no baser instincts and the sub-prime lenders and oil companies are just yearning to become more enlightened members of the community.

Sorry but overly sunny language brings out my cynical side. Even liberals know that not everyone wants to play nice. In fact, that's why we're so rabid about protections and search for practical systems that ensure justice and equality. I wanted something more realistic and insightful.

[Betty Gilgoff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Try this first: Jot down on a napkin or whatever is handy a dozen things you consider most important or precious for a good life.

Now imagine a world where the things that we value are measured and strived for in terms of success; a society where your list of what matters gets factored into our society's measure of progress and growth, a part of the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) if you will. If having time to read or be with your children or friends matters to you, shouldn't you be getting more of that as our communities becomes more prosperous, our society more developed? So again, imagine a world where our well-being and happiness is what we work towards as a community, and what drives our economy and our government policies.

In his book the Economics of Happiness: Building Genuine Wealth, Mark Anielski claims that within our lifetime such a world is within our reach. He carefully walks through how it can work, why it hasn't as yet, with a bit of an historical perspective as to what put us off track, and then provides a number of examples of small businesses and communities that are already growing a real economy of happiness based on his concept of Genuine Wealth. What is needed he believes is the adoption of a system for measuring and promoting Genuine Wealth, a system of real economics that is concerned with real issues, those that matter to individuals. His ideas for transformation involve ways to reign in our monetary system by giving control over money creation and debt back to the government and community as we explore the question of the relationship between our economic wealth and our ability to live as we would like. "[G]enerating more economic output and consuming more stuff does not necessarily generate what society wants and needs." (Location 893 in Kindle Edition) His argument is well researched, well articulated, believable and uplifting.

Anielski is well suited for laying out a plan for building Genuine Wealth as he comes from a diverse background which includes economics, forestry, accounting and religious studies. He has three university degrees and years of experience as a professional economist, including as a senior government economic policy analyst at Alberta Environment. He is currently an adjunct professor at the University of Alberta School of Business where he teaches a course in Corporate Social Responsibility and Social Entrepreneurship. He is a founding faculty member of the Bainbridge Graduate Institute in Washington, which was the first MBA program in the US dedicated to sustainable business practices and ethics. As President and CEO of Anielski Management Inc. he consults around the globe with companies, corporations, communities and policy makers who are looking for new ways to promote sustainability and generate well-being.

Anielski explains clearly in his book, partially through providing some historical insights into the "mystery" of economics, money, trade and power, how currently financial capital is all that gets counted in our standard measure of progress, the "holy" GDP. But the GDP is a poor measure.

Using the words of one of his students he explains the problem in "[...]that everything that costs a buck gets added to the gross domestic product, but nothing is ever subtracted. How clever - I wish I could do that with my checkbook. Chemotherapy for Aunt Ellie from all those Marlboros? Ka-ching! Toxic waste clean-up? Ka-ching! Clear-cutting old growth forests? Ka-ching! Everything adds to the GDP even though most people would consider the above examples negatives for society. It's as if you were doing your finances with only the addition key on the calculator functioning--nothing ever gets subtracted." (Location 1326)

Currently financial capital drives too much of what is valued as important. Making money has become all that matters, often despite the consequences; despite the fact that natural resources are being depleted (natural capital) or that communities or individuals are being harmed (social and human capital). The real meaning of the value of wealth has been lost. In our current systems of measuring, using GDP, the negative impacts have no way to figure into calculations, particularly when projects and bottom-line reports are over the short term. But times are changing; communities, individuals and even businesses are demanding more. With climate change so clearly on our doorstep and a growing understanding of the need for sustainability, more of us are wondering "why free-market, capitalist economics look more like a cancer cell than the self-renewing life cycle of an ancient forest[.]" (Location 174) How much longer can our world sustain never-ending growth? As a society we are starting to demand that economists and policy makers begin to ask different and "right" questions. By ignoring Genuine Wealth, a concept which encompasses financial capital along with built capital (that which we make), natural capital, social capital, and human capital as equally important components of the measure, economists are missing out on what is really valued. In this way we have allowed ourselves to become slaves to money instead of having money be only what it was ever intended to be, a token of exchange.

Measures of Genuine Wealth consider both positive and negative factors from all five kinds of capital: natural, social, human, built and financial. In fact "[t]he concept of genuine wealth is something so basic that we knew what it was as children. It was about having time with the people we love, petting a puppy, eating fresh peas out of the garden, having time to pursue our passions. Now too many of us have to schedule our time three weeks out with our Palm Pilots to jam a get-together with friends into our busy schedule."(Location 1330) Anielski's concept of Genuine Wealth considers that the conditions of well-being that are true to our core values of life. (Location 436) In fact he takes this further in that wealthy communities are those that "work in a spirit of collective and shared responsibility or stewardship to ensure that the various conditions of well-being that add to quality of life are flourishing, vibrant, life-giving and sustainable for current and future generations." (Location 438) He adds to this that it means supporting all members of the community.

Unlike so much of what I have read in my own search for how to make a difference, Anielski's book is practical and optimistic. Anielski doesn't offer a magical solution. Nor does he suggest that we have to storm government or corporate offices or come together and agree on a plan for change. Instead he documents many of the small ways that change is already starting to happen, much like the growth of the organic food industry that is finally taking hold. He holds up champions to the cause, organizations such as MEC, VanCity, Interface, Upstream21, BALLE, and Bainbridge Graduate Institute, to name just a few, not touting any of them as perfect solutions but simply as small groups that are well on their way to changing the way business is being conducted. Each of these small, usually local initiatives demonstrates how businesses can function and even excel in a sustainable manner that adds value or real wealth to the community by having business policies and plans that are not solely defined by maximizing shareholder value. Businesses, he believes have both an opportunity and a responsibility to add value to the community, to contribute to the well-being of the communities that supports them. Likewise, ideally citizens have a right and a responsibility to demand that and be involved. "What if a citizen panel could regularly scrutinize corporate charters to assess whether these enterprises were contributing to improved well-being conditions in their community?" (Location 1959) Similarly with money, for reducing it to the local level and eliminating interest and/or usury, Anielski provides examples of alternatives for pooling resources and exchanging goods in ways that make sense to the people and add to the well-being of the community. Banks like JAK Members' Bank in Sweden or Shorebank in Ilawako, Washington, provide examples. In Indonesia, a time currency, narayan banjar, is yet another example. Narayan banjar is used in exchange for time given to community projects organized through a "Banjar" operating at the local level. Banjars are run democratically with locally elected representatives involved in monthly meetings to plan projects. For Anielski, couching his ideas in real working projects gives credit to his theory and demonstrates how policies grounded in the concept of Genuine Wealth not only make sense but add true wealth that contributes to the well-being of citizens and helps to create flourishing communities.

This book has taken me by surprise. I cracked it open expecting a quick read, something that given the title, The Economics of Happiness, might be a tad flakey or easy to dismiss. Happiness and Economics just seemed too incongruent for a serious read. However I had agreed to read the book to write this review and so approached the task earnestly, jotting my notes with no idea at the start of where it would end. To my delight and dismay I found that the book took an inordinate amount of time because the content was rich, informative, and thoughtful. I found myself wanting to soak up everything and really understand. As Anielski worked through history and economics his writing made me curious and so I took myself on tangential expeditions over and over again. Similarly as the text moved on to examples of sustainable businesses, I wanted more, this time because I wanted to sit with the idea of people, businesses, and communities that care. Reading The Economics of Happiness: Building Genuine Wealth has given me pause to consider how I bank, how I invest, how I choose to live and how I'll alter where I put my energy. It was gratifying to read. If reading this review doesn't make you at least a little curious about your own relationship to money, wealth and well-being then it is only because I haven't done justice to Anielski's thesis. I would encourage you to read the book for yourself.

As I wrap up my review I am not surprised to learn that the book which was originally printed in 2007 has been reprinted in 2009 and is still not out of date. In 2008 the book was awarded two medals; gold for Consciousness Business Leadership, Los Angeles Nautilus Book Awards and bronze for Economics, Axiom Book Awards in New York. It is a book well worth reading.

Mark Anielski will be speaking in Surrey, BC at the British Columbia Teachers for Peace and Global Education Conference on Friday, October 25, 2013, Education for an Economics of Happiness. I will be interested in Mark's ideas for how teachers, students and school communities can best join in to "redesign our economy based on the principles of right livelihood, stewardship, giving and receiving (reciprocity), genuine competition (striving together), abundance, moderation, sufficiency and harmony with nature." (Location 948) I hope you'll join us. For more information go to http://pagebc.ca.

[Gina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anielski is among the economists who have taken up the ideas of Herman Daly and Cliff Cobb arguing for a more complete accounting of wealth than the standard GDP. The Genuine Progress Index (GPI) factors in non-monetary aspects of an economy (e.g., childcare, taking care of the aged; ecosystem services) as well as externalities (e.g., pollution, ecosystem fragmentation) to come up with a measure of "genuine wealth," which Anielski defines as "those conditions of well-being that align with our heartfelt values of what makes life worth living." This is a book about economics in its Greek sense, oikonomia, the management of one's household--whether at the personal or the national level--in a way that leads to the common good. Anyone who shies from normal economic texts, laden with formulae and jargon, should have no fear: Anielski keeps both to a minimum and makes the dismal science appealing and even inspiring. In addition to accounts of how the GPI is devised, he includes material about his experiences assessing the GPI of Alberta, Canada, tools for surveying individual and community wealth, and ideas about using the concept of genuine wealth in business and government to transition to a more sustainable future--a new economy of well-being in which the myth of infinite growth gives way to prudential moderation.

[RK · Rating 4 out of 5]

An economics book that piqued my interest solely from the title. Having begun my undergrad studies into the subject and increasingly looking for a source of value that isn't based only on monetary funds. Understanding that interest rates, inflation, and endless consumption will only lead to mass environmental degradation as well as a fleeting sense of needing things in the name of consumerism. This is not the pursuit of happiness that Thomas Jefferson envisioned in the Declaration of Independence, Anielski manages to present an updated format to measure genuine wealth in individual, commercial, and national terms. I personally used the Personal Genuine Wealth Survey to evaluate my well being, and think the overall view to wealth and oikonomia will lead to more prosperous communities and firms in this century. I hope that more people read this as well as Andrew Yang's War on Normal People, as both will be the way forward as we progress in the most change-driven century of modern human life.

[Grace · Rating 2 out of 5]

Generally I love economic books that aren't pure economics. However, I couldn't really get into Anielski's writing. A lot of it is just so unrealistic. It's beautiful prose about how we can live in large communities, each of us having what we want and no one stepping on another's toes. I've lived in a socialist economy. I don't any more because it was not the picturesque way of life that everyone wishes it was. There's still fighting and squabbling. That's the human way.

Nevertheless, there are a few good ideas on what ways we could understand one another then find a little more balance within the way we live. Some what more sustainable. The thing is... I can't remember a single one of them. It's like it's the obvious solutions of only taking what you need instead of all you can. Over and over and over again.

I'll end up reading it again, but not for a good long time. And even then, only in small quantities.

[Alex · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic book. It's a bit dry (to me) and thus was a slow read but totally worth it. Anielski, a Canadian economist who has done considerable amounts of work in the U.S., is focused on creating a new measure for countries and individuals on how we value 'how we are doing'. Using GDP, he argues, shows us how much we are spending but completely ignores intangibles such as health, education, natural resources. For example, a terminal cancer patient is great for GDP because they spend a lot and thus, by our government's calculations that money spent is great for the country. Bizarre thinking ultimately. Anielski writes clearly and understandably and does well outlining his concepts. So much to think about. I wish our legislature would read and consider these concepts - there's a lot here.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

An OK read. Halfway through I was thinking of putting it down, but there were a couple of interesting chapters in the second half.

The writing is wordy and quite repetitive, and the editing is terrible (some chapters had dozens of typos). Still, some interesting concepts. I don't recommend this one unless you have some particular interest in the subject matter.

[Dana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Slow to read, but extremely interesting so far.

[Lindsey]

for a sustainability book club at work. Premise sounds very interesting!

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good treatment of the study of wellbeing and some guides for choosing a life that makes us truly happy. Why is that such a taboo word??

[June · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a textbook I would have choosen...