The Hedonic Treadmill

A second factor is what is called habituation or the hedonic treadmill. People adapt or habituate to their new incomes. Layard explains this in Happiness: “When I get a new home or a new car, I am excited at first. But then I get used to it, and my mood tends to revert to where it was before. Now I feel I need the bigger house and the better car. If I went back to the old house and car, I would be much less happy than I was before I had experienced something better…. Once your situation becomes stable again, you will revert to your `set-point’ level of happiness. “The things that we get used to most easily and most take for granted are our material possessions-our car, our house. Advertisers understand this and invite us to `feed our addiction’ with more and more spending. However, other experiences do not pale in the same way-the time we spend with our family and friends, and the quality and security of our job.”

–James Gustav Spaeth, The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment, and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability (2009)