Luckily, Money Doesn’t Buy Happiness

November 2, 2011 by John Myers


Reportedly, the standard of living for Americans has fallen further and more steeply over the past three years than at any time since the U.S. government began recording it five decades ago.

I spent some time in the steam room of the Spokane Club, drinking a cold beer, on an autumn Saturday some 30 years ago. Four times a week, my best friend and I would lift weights at what was and is today a rather swanky athletic and social club. I went there because my company paid for the membership and it had a terrific weight room, not because I wanted to hobnob with Spokane’s rich and famous.

On that particular afternoon, I noticed the other men in the steam room. We were quite the crew: two lawyers, a life insurance salesman, a realtor, two stock brokers and, in my case, an investment writer (yes, I get the irony in my writing about this subject).

I commented to my best friend Mark that none of us were really contributing to building a better society — at least not in a way that could be easily measured. The Spokane Club was a world apart from the Calgary Petroleum Club, a place where my dad sometimes took me to when I was a kid.

Fifty years ago, the people at the Petroleum Club were mostly geologists, contractors, engineers, wildcatters and cattle ranchers. There were a handful of stock brokers and car dealers as well; but back then, they were the minority.

America Is One Big Service Center

For many years, I had an old diesel Mercedes-Benz. My friends used to tease me, saying it was so old that Heinrich Himmler had driven it. Sutherland Mercedes in Spokane was up the street from my office, so I took my car there to get the oil changed. There’s no question Mercedes-Benz makes a beautiful car, but I doubt its new $100,000 sedan is four times nicer than a new $25,000 Ford sedan.

One day, I was sitting in the nice showroom drinking cheap coffee and waiting for my oil change. A doctor I knew was car shopping with his trophy wife, who looked to be half his age. The salesman was selling them a big Mercedes that would be her car.

She was giddy at the prospect of getting it. Why wouldn’t she be? I doubt she had to contribute a nickel toward the black Autobahn-slayer which she was itching to show off to her South Hill society friends.

The salesman knew he had the doctor on the ropes so he told the couple: “You know, if you buy a new car from us, we will hand wash it for you free and have it ready in 15 minutes.â€