Here's To The Big Bucks And May We Be Happy If We Make Them

There are a couple of money stories we can tie together to raise an interesting thought in this season of "better to give than receive".

The first is about the expectation of millennials. YCharts, an investment research platform, surveyed millennials (ages 22 to 37) and found 65 percent said they'll reach seven-figure wealth by age 45 or sooner. Good luck with that and don't forget your "older friends"!

Now, let's do a reality check. Sean Brown, the CEO of YCharts says those predictions make it seem like it's pretty unlikelythat most millennials will be worth seven figures by the time they're 45. But why are millennials so "delusional"? Wealth therapist Agnes Kowalski says it's because millennials in particular "have incredibly powerful new belief systems about not capping how much money can be earned."

But let's just say that somehow our millennial friends pull it off and have baskets full of money by 45. Will that make them happy?

Harvard Business School researchers asked 2,000 millionaires about their level of happiness. The results showed nearly every respondent said they'd need to double or triple their wealth in order to be perfectly content. Wait! What? Millionaires wanting & needing more? Yup!

How much more? Well, 25 percent of those worth $1.5 million said they'd need eleven times more money to be perfectly happy, while another 25 percent said they'd need six times as much.

Study results show those who earned their fortune were happier than those who merely inherited it, and that millionaires worth more than $7.6 million were found to be happier than those with about $1.2 million.

So in conclusion: Today's Millennials are likely not to make a million by 45 but even if they did, they wouldn't be happy. Sheesh!

Categories: Finance