More Depressed the Easier Life Gets: So I'm listening to John and Ken on KFI radio, a couple of fellas I find obnoxious but usually agree with, while I'm waiting for the news to come on.

And John starts talking about a book he's reading that sounds great. It's called The Progress Paradox, and it's about the way that, despite the fact that we're far better off as a people than we were fifty or even a hundred years ago, we're less satisfied with life, and, in general, less happy.

John, the "tirader" of the pair, launched into a tirade about how lame everybody is for wanting to get free health care, to the point that grocery workers are losing their homes and letting their children go hungry because they don't want to pay an extra five bucks somewhere or other in their health plan. They'll pay hundreds of dollars for vacations, scores of dollars to get cable each month, but to keep themselves healthy, they won't shell out a dime.

I didn't stick around to hear John's explanation of why, (it was probably something really insightful like, "People are just stupid) nor do I know the author of the book's.

But I know mine, and I will be more than happy to share it with the four of you who, according to sitemeter, read this blog.

The answer is, the more technology and progress allow us to control our environment, the less people want to feel responsible for anything they weren't able to control. A farmer seventy-five years ago would have felt more personal responsibility if say, a fire burned up all of his crops. Today, a farmer on the same property would want someone else to pay for it. Since it was not his own action that led to the event, he is not responsible for the event, ergo, he should not have to pay it.

This is why people don't want to pay for their health care. The vacation to Hawaii, the cable, all of those were choices the person made, and so they're willing to shell out money for them. But an illness? A natural disaster? Why should they have to take responsibility for those things? It wasn't their fault!

In other words, people believe they have the right to be protected from any damage they did not cause themselves.

I even have to qualify that, by revising the last sentence to be that they didn't intentionally cause themselves. In other words, if they slip and fall and break their arm, they shouldn't have to pay for it. I didn't mean to!

They only apply this logic to themselves. Since somebody has to be responsible, the people who owned the sidewalk they were walking on in the rain must be at fault. Never mind that they didn't mean to. It's somebody's fault and it's not mine, therefore it's yours.

So why does this make them unhappy?

Because their desire to cast responsibility on others progresses into the sphere of happiness. They feel they are unhappy about something, and the thing they're unhappy about isn't their fault, ergo they are no more responsible for trying to make themselves happy than they are to pay for their broken arm. Somebody, their boss, the government, their spouse, needs to stop doing all the things that are making them unhappy. Or do more stuff to make them happy. Or something, because whatever the world is doing isn't making them happy.

This causes lots of people to pursue political or other agendas designed to force the government, or employers, or others to provide more happiness. Which, of course, is impossible.

Not to sound like Dr. Phil, but the only person who can make you happy is you.

And the government, your employer, me, none of us caused the flood or the fire or the broken arm either. And if you come to me, one on one, and let me know you need help, I'll probably be more than happy to do it. But don't transfer responsibility to us, because you don't think it ever belonged to you.