The Wonder Years Are Over | Zero Hedge
Happiness is never just a matter of material wants or needs. We humans are wired to compare what we have to what others have... and to always try to find ways get one up on our neighbors. If we earn more than the guy next door, we are tempted to try to make him feel bad by flaunting it. If he earns more than we do, we will want to take something away from him... to bring him down a peg. That is the emotional foundation underlying socialist politics – envy, dressed up as social justice.
The trouble with taking something away from your neighbor is that then he tries to take something away from you. Pretty soon, you are both spending so much of your time trying to enact rules and regulations that penalize one group and reward another that neither of you is producing more wealth.
