The Little Book of Lykke: The Danish Search for the World's Happiest People(14)

However, trying to signal that you have wealth is not a recent phenomenon. Back in 1899, the American sociologist Thorstein Veblen coined the term ‘conspicuous consumption’, which describes the phenomenon of buying luxury goods in order to publicly display your wealth to attain status. Veblen had noticed that a lot of the then nouveau riche Americans spent a great deal of their fortune on signalling how rich they were. This is the reason why some people today spend $15 million on a gold iPhone with six hundred inlaid white diamonds and fifty-three more diamonds for the Apple logo on the back. Apart from signalling how much money you have, it still does what a normal iPhone does and Siri still doesn’t understand what you are saying. However, if you think that is extravagant, let me tell you that Aristotle Onassis had the bar stools on his luxury yacht, Christina O, upholstered with leather made from the foreskins of whales. So, if you ever feel bad about your indulgences, just remember that one of the world’s richest men once spent a fortune on whale-foreskin bar stools.

The point of it all is that, if we spend our money on stuff we don’t need to impress people, we are not getting closer to happiness, we are just getting involved in an arms race. That is why we would all be better off if we all put a lid on the bling.

THE LAW OF JANTE

In Denmark, and throughout the Nordic countries, conspicuous consumption is being somewhat curbed because of Janteloven, or the Law of Jante. The ‘law’ comes from a 1933 novel by Danish-Norwegian Aksel Sandemose and can be boiled down to ‘You’re no better than us.’ It promotes a culture where people of high status are criticized because they have been classified as better – or pretend to be better – than their peers. In English, this is known as tall-poppy syndrome.





You’re not to think you are more important than we are.

You’re not to think you are anything special.

You’re not to convince yourself that you are better than we are.

You’re not to think anyone cares about you.

You’re not to think you know more than we do.

You’re not to think you are smarter than we are.

You’re not to think you are good at anything.

You’re not to think you are as good as we are.

You’re not to laugh at us.

You’re not to think you can teach us anything.



This is a big component of Scandinavian culture and the reason why you will see very few flashy luxury cars in Denmark. Well, that and a 150 per cent car tax, obviously. But the Jantelov goes deeper and wider than cars.

Where success may be enthusiastically flaunted in the US, humbleness is the bigger virtue in Scandinavia. Buy a luxury car with a personal licence plate saying ‘SUCCESS’ (as I saw in Riga, Latvia), and you can expect to have your car keyed within a day or two.

There are a lot of negative implications to the Law of Jante, but I do think we tend to overlook one positive aspect: it does seek to curb conspicuous consumption, and that may not be a bad thing. Being exposed to other people’s wealth can have a negative effect. In South Korea, they have a saying for all this: ‘If one cousin buys land, the other cousin gets a stomach ache.’





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RICHER BUT NOT HAPPIER


In many ways, South Korea is the poster child for the key challenge facing many developed countries. Over the past two generations, South Korea has gone from being one of the poorest to one of the richest countries in the world.

While grandparents may remember famine, their grandsons and granddaughters enjoy some of the highest standards of living in the world, while the country holds top positions in life expectancy, health-care efficiency and proportion of people with a university education. The economic growth achieved by the South Korean people is quite simply an amazing achievement. Coming back to Copenhagen after visiting Seoul feels like travelling ten years back in time. However, the country is struggling to convert its new-found wealth into well-being. South Korea ranks fifty-fifth in the World Happiness Report of 2017 and, more alarmingly, it has top ranking when it comes to suicide rates in OECD countries.

South Korea also sends more visitors to our Happiness Research Institute than any other country. South Korean politicians, mayors, journalists, university students and professors have all come in search of ways to improve the quality of life in their country. ‘For many years, we have been looking at the US as the big role model,’ one told me. ‘That is where we wanted to take the country. But now we are not so sure that’s the way we wish to go any more.’

And the US is a key example when it comes to looking at how we have failed to transform wealth into well-being. While the US has achieved economic progress and an accumulation of wealth over the past half-century, this has not resulted in an increase of happiness for the people. One of the reasons for this is inequality. If a country doubles in wealth but 90 per cent of that wealth goes to the richest 10 per cent, that is not growth. That is greed. And no, Gordon Gekko, when it comes to happiness, greed is neither good, nor does it work. And your braces look stupid.





DECOUPLE WELL-BEING AND WEALTH


It is September, but it is still warm (from a Viking perspective) in Copenhagen, and this Friday there is a clear blue sky. I leave the office a bit earlier than usual and cycle ten minutes to the central harbour of Copenhagen to meet my buddy Michael for a swim.