We are social animals. We cannot be an isolated self. Affluence allows us to become more and more independent from each other. It allows us to isolate ourselves.
This is the big irony. We are “wealthier” than most people on earth yet we are lonelier than most people on earth. The “stuff” that we buy with our wealth, the “safety” that we buy with our wealth, the “independence” that we buy with our wealth, it all seems to diminish the very thing that gives life meaning - the generative power of human connection. Our wealth is making us scared. Depressed. And small.
David Brooks wrote an awesome column about The Great Affluence Fallacy: