The elusive concept of happiness

and its connection to neoliberalism

After blogging for more than 15 years at TheMoneyIllusion, I felt it was time for a change.  This new blog will continue to cover many of the same topics:

1.     Monetary economics, where I have a great deal of expertise.

2.     Economic policy, where I have some expertise.

3.     Other topics, where I have no expertise but lots of interest and lots of opinions.  (Film, art, architecture, city planning, philosophy, history, science, travel, the NBA/Bucks, 60s/70s pop music, 19^th century Anglo-American novels, more recent foreign novels, etc.)

I am happy to consider requests for specific topics that you’d like to see me cover.  But don’t ask me for my views on things where I have nothing of value to add---say the debate over abortion, or Israel/Gaza.

So why create a new blog?  At some point, I will probably begin to monetize this blog, but I would move to Substack even if that were not an option.  I needed a clean break with a blog that had gotten stale.  A new start.  I also like the format over here.

Blog titles often have multiple layers of meaning. TheMoneyIllusion referred to the fact that cognitive illusions about monetary economics are my stock and trade, but also that nominal shocks are extremely important because the public suffers from money illusion (and related issues such as sticky wages.)

The Pursuit of Happiness nods in several directions.  I do blogging partly because it makes me happy and partly because I hope it makes others happy.  A second layer is that I aim to make this blog have a happier tone than TheMoneyIllusion.  Back in 2010, Tyler Cowen did a post on advice to public intellectuals.  I won’t reproduce the entire list, but here are a few items:

 2. Avoid criticizing other public intellectuals.  In fact, avoid the negative as much as possible.  However pressing a social or economic issue may be, there is almost always a positive and constructive way to reframe your potential contribution.  This also will force you to keep on thinking harder, because it is easier to take apparently justified negative slaps at the wrongdoers.

7. Shy away from discussion of political candidates as much as possible.  “Run away” is better yet.

8. Try not to write things, including tweets, a less analytical and intelligent person also could have written.

9. Do not press the button.

10. Hang around happy, cheery people.  That said, also have some ornery friends determined to make (intellectual) life difficult for you.  You need both.

Notice that Tyler is trying to nudge us in a happier direction.  It occurred to me that it might be a mistake if 10 years from now I ended up on my deathbed, bitterly regretting that I spent the final decade of my life as a grouchy old man.  So why not give happiness a shot?  What’s the worst that could happen?  Being mocked by cynical trolls who hate the world?

The third layer of meaning refers to my belief that happiness is the only thing that matters.  Imagine if the entire universe had contained no life.  It’s not easy, because your imagination is a part of life.  That blue planet going around the sun doesn’t look blue without a retina and brain to register that color.

Even so, stuff would still exist in a lifeless universe and things would still happen.  Colorless rocks would tumble down mountains during landslides.  But without life, everything would be gray and meaningless.

In a sense, happiness (and its negative, misery) is the only thing that matters. Not the only thing that matters to me; the only thing that matters in the entire universe.  Without happiness, the entire universe (multiverse?) would be nothing more than a gigantic Greenland, a huge, meaningless waste of space.  In that case, it would be no loss if the universe had never existed. 

I would continue to hold this view even if you convinced me than my political utilitarianism is wrong. But this obviously requires a very expansive definition of happiness, one that is closer to “the apprehension of the good”.  Good and bad are words that have no meaning in a lifeless universe; they only come to life if there is happiness and pain. 

In the second (longer) part of this post I take a deep dive into the phrase “the pursuit of happiness”, and explain how it relates to neoliberalism.

Part 2.  An expansive view of happiness

For most people, the new blog title will be seen as a reference to the famous words in the Declaration of Independence. But what exactly did Thomas Jefferson mean by that ambiguous phrase?  According to Wikipedia, no one seems to know.

The phrase clearly echoes John Locke’s “life, liberty, and estate”, sometimes written “life, liberty, and property”.  From a logical perspective, Locke’s phrasing seems to make more sense.  After all, life, liberty and property are three things that can be secured by a well functioning legal system. So why didn’t Jefferson adopt Locke’s terminology?  Here’s Wikipedia:

Benjamin Franklin was in agreement with Thomas Jefferson in playing down the protection of "property" as a goal of government. It is noted that Franklin found the property to be a "creature of society" and thus, he believed that it should be taxed as a way to finance civil society.

That makes sense.  The founders were classical liberals, not anarchists who viewed all taxation as theft of property.  But why replace property with the pursuit of happiness?  What exactly does that phrase mean?

Wikipedia cites Garry Wills:

Garry Wills has argued that Jefferson did not take the phrase from Locke and that it was indeed meant to be a standard by which governments should be judged.  Wills suggests Adam Ferguson as a good guide to what Jefferson had in mind:

"If, in reality, courage and a heart devoted to the good of mankind are the constituents of human felicity, the kindness which is done infers a happiness in the person from whom it proceeds, not in him on whom it is bestowed; and the greatest good which men possessed of fortitude and generosity can procure to their fellow creatures is a participation of this happy character. If this be the good of the individual, it is likewise that of mankind; and virtue no longer imposes a task by which we are obliged to bestow upon others that good from which we ourselves refrain; but supposes, in the highest degree, as possessed by ourselves, that state of felicity which we are required to promote in the world." 

As a utilitarian, I like those thoughts.  But it seems implausible that the founders intended to enshrine “maximize aggregate utility” into the Declaration of Independence.  Recall Nietzsche’s famous remark:

Man does not strive for happiness; only the Englishman does that.

(I presume that was a dig at English philosophers like Bentham and Mill.)

And skepticism about utilitarianism goes well beyond Nietzsche.  Utilitarian philosophers have been criticized for having an excessively narrow vision of human life.  But the Wikipedia article suggests that 17^th and 18^th century intellectuals had an expansive view of what it meant to pursue happiness:

The 17th-century cleric and philosopher Richard Cumberland wrote that promoting the well-being of our fellow humans is essential to the "pursuit of our own happiness". Locke never associated natural rights with happiness, but his philosophical opponent Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz made such an association in the introduction to his Codex Iuris Gentium. William Wollaston's The Religion of Nature Delineated describes the "truest definition" of "natural religion" as being "The pursuit of happiness by the practice of reason and truth". An English translation of Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui's Principles of Natural and Politic Law prepared in 1763 extolled the "noble pursuit" of "true and solid happiness" in the opening chapter discussing natural rights. Historian Jack Rakove posits Burlamaqui as a source in addition to Locke as inspiration for Jefferson's phrase.

Another possible source for the phrase is in the Commentaries on the Laws of England published by Sir William Blackstone, from 1765 to 1769, which are often cited in the laws of the United States. Blackstone argues that God “has so intimately connected, so inseparably interwoven the laws of eternal justice with the happiness of each individual, that the latter cannot be attained but by observing the former; and, if the former be punctually obeyed, it cannot but induce the latter.“

These views are a long way from defining happiness in simple hedonistic terms.  This sort of happiness isn’t something you get by spending your wages on cheap hookers and whiskey.

Nonetheless, Jefferson’s intention in using the phrase “the pursuit of happiness” remains elusive.  If it means the freedom to pursue happiness, then it’s redundant with “liberty”.  If it implies that people positively should pursue happiness, then it seems like an odd insertion of utilitarian philosophy into a political document.  It’s almost become a cliché among philosophers that you don’t get happiness by pursuing happiness; you get it by pursuing a good life.  Jefferson surely understood that.

You might think that I am too focused on logic, while the Declaration of Independence was a rhetorical call to arms.  Perhaps we should view this phrase in more expansive terms, as a literary statement, not a legal document.  My favorite interpretation comes from V.S. Naipaul:

Familiar words, easy to take for granted; easy to misconstrue . . . This idea of the pursuit of happiness is at the heart of the civilization to so many outside it or on the periphery.  I find it marvelous to contemplate to what an extent, after two centuries, and after the terrible history of the earlier part of this century, the idea has come to a kind of fruition.  It is an elastic idea; it fits all men.  It implies a certain kind of society, a certain kind of awakened spirit.  So much is contained in it: the idea of the individual, responsibility, choice, the life of the intellect, the idea of vocation and perfectibility and achievement.  It is an immense human idea.  It cannot be reduced to a fixed system.  It cannot generate fanaticism.  But it is known to exist; and because of that, other more rigid systems in the end blow away.  (From a talk given in 1991)

The date is important.  This was pretty close to “peak optimism” in all of human history, as the Iron Curtain had just come down and both democracy and free markets seemed to be advancing.  Today, things don’t look so good.

In Naipaul’s novels, and indeed in almost all novels, characters do not exist in a haze of blissful happiness.  For the most part they are unhappy, and also in pursuit of .  .  . something.  The real world is like that too.  The essence of life is the pursuit, not the destination.  For Naipaul, the pursuit of happiness seems to imply something like living life to the fullest.  If Jefferson had this in mind, then the pursuit of happiness is not just the third item on a checklist; it is everything that makes life good.

Two years later, we were still in that blissful neoliberal era, and Vaclav Havel made this comment in Summer Meditations:

Though my heart may be left of centre, I have always known that the only economic system that works is a market economy, in which everything belongs to someone---which means that someone is responsible for everything.  It is a system in which complete independence and plurality of economic entities exist within a legal framework, and its workings are guided chiefly by the laws of the marketplace. This is the only natural economy, the only kind that makes sense, the only one that can lead to prosperity, because it is the only one that reflects the nature of life itself.

The Naipaul and Havel quotations reflect the world I’d like to get back to.  (Hence this blog’s subtitle.) Like Naipaul and Havel, I have an expansive view of concepts like free markets and the pursuit of happiness.   I oppose all forms of fanaticism, all “rigid systems”.  The world is very complex, and it is unlikely that any single ideology has all of the answers.  Even so, some ideas seem more useful than others.  For me, three ideas appear to be the most promising for human flourishing:

1.     Utilitarianism: The well being of each person is equally valuable.

2.     Democracy: Using the wisdom of crowds to make political decisions.

3.     Free markets: The most productive way to organize an economy.

Utilitarianism, democracy and free market capitalism may not be precisely right in each and every circumstance.  There are cases where exceptions will have to be made.  Nonetheless, these three concepts are likely to provide a better guide to public policy than any other set of ideas.  I see them as answering three basic questions:

1.     What destination is best? (Denmark)

2.     How do we decide which road to take? (Switzerland)

3.     Which road do I personally think is best? (Singapore)

In a democracy I vote for free market capitalism, because I believe that it is the system that maximizes aggregate utility (the destination). I put those three countries in parentheses, as I view them as the best examples of utilitarianism, democracy and free markets. (This paper from 2008 explains why.)

While I favor neoliberal public policies, I am agnostic as to how to achieve happiness at a personal level.  I suspect that most of us (including me) suffer cognitive illusions in this area, thinking that we can become happy by achieving this or that goal.  Thus I doubt whether having more money actually makes most people happier, at least beyond a fairly modest income level. But that doesn’t make me an anti-capitalist leftist, as I also believe that a liberal society that allows one to freely pursue one’s goals does make one happier, even if those goals are illusory.  A thirsty man wandering in the desert is happy at the moment when he sees an oasis on the horizon, even if the oasis later turns out to be a mirage.  Happiness is often nothing more than the anticipation of future happiness.  

Imagine a challenging journey you took after college, or a stressful love affair. Perhaps you were a bit miserable for much of the time. In your later life you might have thought back on these adventures dozens of times, fondly reminiscing over the events. Those happy memories might even turn a net negative into net positive.

Happiness seems endlessly elusive—always somewhere else. Is it youthful anticipation of the future? Proustian recollection of past adventures? Or in the moment? Perhaps happiness is skill, remembering to focus on the food while at a fine restaurant, not the conversation. (A skill I lack.)

These sorts of examples makes the economists’ narrow calculus of “utils” from purchasing “goods and services” seem hopelessly inadequate. I suspect that utilitarianism remains unpopular among philosophers because both its supporters and opponents lack a sufficiently expansive view of the subject.

If we define happiness too broadly, it becomes almost a tautology that people pursue happiness.  Too narrowly, and it becomes a distasteful form of hedonism.  To see my intermediate conception of happiness, consider three examples:

1.     A child exhilarated by riding a roller coaster

2.     A mother’s deep love for her baby

3.     A person who pursues virtues such as courage, honesty, dignity, patience, and benevolence

When I use the term ‘happiness’, I’m thinking of a concept expansive enough to include the first two items on the list.  I see the other virtues (item #3) as instrumental; ways of living that in the long run contribute to boosting the aggregate happiness of society.  So my utilitarianism is not tautological.  There are other things that seem to matter, but only because they ultimately contribute to more or less happiness.

Here’s Scott Alexander:

Admittedly altruism also has some of this same problem. Auden said that “God put us on Earth to help others; what the others are here for, I don’t know.” At some point altruism has to bottom out in something other than altruism. Otherwise it’s all a Ponzi scheme, just people saving meaningless lives for no reason until the last life is saved and it all collapses.

I have no real answer to this question - which, in case you missed it, is “what is the meaning of life?” 

And he also quotes Matt Yglesias:

Good things are good.

I’m not sure if we are put here to be happy, but given that we are here, why not aim for happiness?

And finally, an expansive view of happiness must mean something more that being pleasing.  I am currently rereading Moby Dick, and came across this sermon:

Woe to him whom this world charms from Gospel duty! Woe to him who seeks to pour oil upon the waters when God has brewed them into a gale! Woe to him who seeks to please rather than to appal! Woe to him whose good name is more to him than goodness! Woe to him who, in this world, courts not dishonor! Woe to him who would not be true, even though to be false were salvation! 

So there will continue to be some posts with a depressing message---the key is to continually remind myself to never do so for the wrong reason.  And I hope that readers will also give careful thought before commenting.  I will continue to allow criticism, but it needs to be respectful.  When deciding whom to ban, my criterion will be whether the decision makes the comment section a better place, a place that more people would wish to visit.  To paraphrase Yglesias, good comments are good.

If this blog is to succeed, I’ll need a lot of help from my readers.

PS.  After writing this post, I came across a blurb on a new book about Jefferson’s phrase, written by Jeffery Rosen.  Here is a part of the description:

By reading the classical Greek and Roman moral philosophers who inspired the Founders, Rosen shows us how they understood the pursuit of happiness as a quest for being good, not feeling good—the pursuit of lifelong virtue, not short-​term pleasure. Among those virtues were the habits of industry, temperance, moderation, and sincerity, which the Founders viewed as part of a daily struggle for self-​improvement, character development, and calm self-​mastery. They believed that political self-​government required personal self-​government. For all six Founders, the pursuit of virtue was incompatible with enslavement of African Americans, although the Virginians betrayed their own principles.

PPS. The Cezanne painting on top is the visual representation of how I think about happiness. It hangs in the National Gallery in DC, and also on the wall of my living room.

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