The Wealth Paradox

This evening I met a gentleman who is in a lucrative profession. Lucrative from my standpoint. Simply put, he makes around 5-10 times as much as I do. That does not mean my income is too paltry. I am making decent money for my profession as a job holder in a public organization. But, he is in a private enterprise and the profession itself is also considered very lucrative. 

As an leisurely talk, our discussion also wandered through many topics and also touched upon the subject of money, income and expenditure. He opined about not being very rich. From others' perspective, he is among the higher echelons of society in terms of wealth and income. A very well-furnished, spacious and fancily designed house, a mid-sized SUV, kids in high-end schools/colleges, he has a life to envy. Still, he said he was just getting along and there were people in his circle who were make wild amounts of money. He was amazed by their money-making skills. 

Here was a normal family man and an experienced professional earning a very good living. Still he talked about others being much richer than himself. I also regularly think that my house is not good enough, I do not have a car (I scrape along in buses, a normal scooter or sometimes in a vehicle of the office), my kids are in a middle-expenditure school/college and my shopping lists are generally curtailed by budget than fatigue. I have nurtured a desire to own a good DSLR for more than five years and am still to muster enough courage to buy one. I think at least ten times and postpone at least by six months before finally ordering a pair of new trousers. I am frugal but sometimes that frugality is the only option given the depth of my pocket. Still, there might be people who would kill to have my standard of living. They look up to me. I look up to that gentleman and even he looks up to someone else more wealthy than himself. 

Notion of wealth and income are paradoxical. On the one hand, wealth is just a means of living one's life. On the other, people run all their life after wealth, in all sorts of ways. Most people think a lot of money would make them happy. But there are people with a lot of money that are seeking happiness away from wealth. Is it related to the so called 'the other side is green' mentality? It may be. It may also be that human's desire for comfort, confidence and control is almost insatiable. The more of these things one gets, the requirement arises for even more. If no real requirement is there, the human mind convinces itself to seek more just for the sake of feeling more powerful, resourceful and better. 

So, if one has a decent life, if one does not need to seek others' help and kindness to live, if one can give his/her loved ones and children a decent living, education and future, the amount of wealth one possesses in terms of cash, goods, real estate, stocks etc are less important to make the life happy and worthwhile. 

09:55 PM, 17 November 2019