How Much is Enough?: Money and the Good Life

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How Much is Enough?: Money and the Good Life

3.55 of 5 stars 3.55 · rating details · 190 ratings · 36 reviews

A provocative and timely call for a moral approach to economics, drawing on philosophers, political theorists, writers, and economists from Aristotle to Marx to Keynes.

What constitutes the good life? What is the true value of money? Why do we work such long hours merely to acquire greater wealth? These are some of the questions that many asked themselves when the financial...more

Hardcover, 256 pages

Published June 19th 2012 by Other Press (first published 2012)

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Jul 29, 2012 Justin Douglas rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Not exactly a breezy read—a bit of a slog, to be honest—but well worth the effort. My recent interest in combining economics and philosophy led me to this book, which is an argument for restoring a moral basis to the 'dismal science,' and rescuing it from the dark corridors of utilitarianism. The premise of the book is: What is the good life, and how can we, as a society, attain it?

I just finished it a couple minutes ago, so rather than a profound review or critique of the book, here's a quick o...more

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Aug 26, 2012 Birgit rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

How much money do you need to lead a good life? What is the good life anyway? In their book How Much Is Enough? Robert and Edward Skidelsky try to get to the bottom of these and related questions.
In 1930 the great economist Keynes said that by 2030 most people would work only 15 hours a week, devoting the rest of their time to leisure. Obviously he was mistaken in his assumption, and the authors show why and how he went wrong with his idea.
There are many books dealing with economy and money, our...more

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Sep 03, 2012 Andrew rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

One-Minute Review

Written by Robert and Edward Skidelsky, How Much is Enough? is my favourite book of the year, and my only five-star rating on Goodreads in 2012. The authors have crafted a philosophical discussion about our insatiable appetites for economic growth, which so far have ignored a key question: "To what end?" As students of John Maynard Keynes, the Skidelskys are all for economic growth through capitalism, but as a means not an end and certainly not at any social and environmental co...more

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May 11, 2013 Peter rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: history-and-science

Although I very much like the idea that the Skidelsky's start from: "how come we are still working nearly as many hours as 50 years ago and have much more comfort and wealth, we are not happier?", the book disappoints a bit when it comes down to the practical realization of the ideal "good life".

They do make a very strong point that economic growth seems to be a goal "an sich"; just listen to many stories in the news for the past couple of years and you will start to believe that even a small de...more

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Aug 24, 2012 Ross Emmett rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: ethics-and-economics, non-fiction

I've written a short review for CHOICE. Here I'll make some more specific comments.

I expected, from comments I've read, a very poor argument for a wishy-washy romantic argument about the end of scarcity. Robert Skidelsky is the biographer of J. Maynard Keynes, who famously thought that the prospects for his grandchildren would be a world without scarcity. (Just this morning I realized that Frank Knight made a quite similar argument in the final chapter of The Economic Organization.) While there...more I've written a short review for CHOICE. Here I'll make some more specific comments.

I expected, from comments I've read, a very poor argument for a wishy-washy romantic argument about the end of scarcity. Robert Skidelsky is the biographer of J. Maynard Keynes, who famously thought that the prospects for his grandchildren would be a world without scarcity. (Just this morning I realized that Frank Knight made a quite similar argument in the final chapter of The Economic Organization.) While there is some of that here, the Skidelskys are focused more on the argument for why we should become less consumption focused than they are on some version of the end of scarcity.

Unfortunately, they are more concerned about mustering as many different arguments for the reduction of consumption than they are in providing a single consistent approach. In part, this results from their demand for, but lack of, a clear basis for why reducing consumption is part of human flourishing. As well, because they assume that rich nations have reached the point at which consumption could be reduced, they do not provide a lot of help for those who are increasing consumption elsewhere in the world. To their credit, they don't argue that others should not pursue what the West has gained, but they don't go too are toward any creditable arguments that would help those in the rest of the world to know what to do.

There is a nice chapter on the problems with the literature on happiness. Deirdre McCloskey's arguments are better, but the Skidelsky's have the general arguments down. For McCloskey, see Happyness in The New Republic.

After all the rhetoric, however, they get down to basics in the last several chapters. Their seven elements of a good life (basic goods) are: health, security, respect, personality (what they mean here is probably Kantian autonomy), harmony with nature, friendship, and leisure (by which they mean doing something for its own sake). The policies designed to provide these basic goods would be (surprise, surprise: not so radical as you thought, are they!): a basic income, an expenditure tax base rather than an income tax base, and constraints on advertising. As well, they expect we need to draw back from further globalization; economic integration, they argue, only contributes to human flourishing when the playing field is level.

On basic incomes, they are more inclined to support demographic capital endowments rather than a guaranteed annual income. There argument for expenditure-based taxes is straightforward Kaldor, which is hardly surprising! The one place they seem to verge into romanticizing policy is in constraints on advertising. About the most they can promote is bunching ads so people can avoid them, and disallowing advertising as a tax-deductible expense.

So on the whole, the book could be used as a good starting point for a conversation about economics and ethics. Those inclined to refer to Catholic social teaching could use the book as a conversation starter, because they make frequent reference to the social encyclicals. In general, I'm dissatisfied with the arguments which support their conclusions, but could also support basic incomes (with no additions for specific groups) and expenditure based taxes (preferably flat rate).

But one could do much better, especially by reading McCloskey's Bourgeois Virtues!(less)

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Oct 01, 2012 Michael Austin rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2012

I really liked this book. I found the author's basic question (How much money does one really need to live a good life?) to be fascinating. And I was glad that, in answering this question, they advanced a notion of "leisure" that has too long been absent in our public discourse. In the classical sense, leisure has nothing to do with watching TV or playing video games; it is, rather, hard work that one performs, not for money, but for the inherent value of the experience.

That said, the book is ab...more

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Oct 20, 2012 Nathan rated it 3 of 5 stars

A review of 3 stars doesn't quite say how much I feel this book has influenced my thought process. The first chapter is amazing, but after that the book falls into some very dense reading that takes some time to get through. It pays off, but definitely requires a good amount of knowledge to the things the authors are referring to, or else the time to find out. Not being an economist or historian, this took me some amount of time.

The pay off is a deeper understanding about why they list the fact...more

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Dec 22, 2012 Mark Sinnott rated it 2 of 5 stars

How much is enough? It is a great question. The authors of this book try to argue (as John Keynes back in the 30s) that there is enough wealth in the world that, if it were spread equally, everyone could live "the good life". While technology goes up, the human labor necessary to produce goods goes down, and people can work half the time and make just as much money. They have a vision of humans using this "leisure" time to create and think as ancient philosophers and artists did.

I find so many f...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Richard Wilson rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is a challenging book, not because the idea of a "good life" in a post-capitalist world is not attractive, it is, but because it is so difficult to define and the means to achieve this end are difficult to grasp. It is a book of ideas and explains them in their historical context. We have lost the morality of the pre-Adam Smith world but not yet reestablished a new morality. It would be unthinkable in Pre-Modern times to desire wealth and to consume the way we do. It no longer has a purpose...more

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Nov 03, 2012 Ilya rated it 3 of 5 stars

In 1930, John Maynard Keynes wrote an essay called "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren", where he argued that the recent stock market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression was a deviation from a trend that would hold in the long term. By 1930, citizens of First World countries had become several times richer than their ancestors at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and were working fewer hours than the ancestors did in the dark Satanic mills. It was reasonable to s...more In 1930, John Maynard Keynes wrote an essay called "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren", where he argued that the recent stock market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression was a deviation from a trend that would hold in the long term. By 1930, citizens of First World countries had become several times richer than their ancestors at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and were working fewer hours than the ancestors did in the dark Satanic mills. It was reasonable to suppose that a hundred years hence they would become several times richer still, and work still less: "three-hour shifts or a fifteen-hour week." 2030 is not far away, and while First World countries are indeed much richer than they were in 1930, their citizens who work full time put in 40-hour weeks, not 15-hour ones. Robert Skidelsky is an economist and a biographer of Keynes, and his son Edward is a sociologist and a philosopher, and they argue that the difference is due to a misguided pursuit of prestige and status goods. A brake on advertising, a progressive consumption tax, and a guaranteed basic income would supposedly redirect people to the pursuit of the good life. The Skidelskys list and explain in depth the constituents of good life: health, security, respect, personality, harmony with nature, friendship and leisure. When consumption conflicts with these goals, the Skidelskys want people to choose the latter, and want the power of the state to back this choice. Then, perhaps, they won't need as much income and as many working hours; perhaps a 20-hour week would become the new norm; inequality, status anxiety and environmental degradation would drop.

Honestly, I cannot say with a straight face that the Skidelskys' proposals are bad. However, I see too many problems with them. I agree with them that respect is one of the components of the good life; however, respect is not something one is born with; it has to be earned. Most people derive a great deal of respect from their professions. One cannot be a computer programmer worthy of respect of one's peers (or a schoolteacher, or a member of any other skilled occupation) by working 20-hour weeks. It just cannot be done, unless the peers also work 20-hour-weeks - and imagine the quality of their work! In order for people to pursue health, society needs skilled doctors, and in order for them to pursue security, it needs skilled policemen; how can they be trained with 20-hour working weeks? Many people love their jobs; for them, work is not only the means to earn money for buying goods and services to enjoy at their leisure, but a joy in itself. You probably want your children to be taught by a schoolteacher who loves teaching, and to drive a car designed by a mechanical engineer who loves engineering. Drastically restricting their working hours will hurt both them and the beneficiaries of their work. Also, a question left largely unanswered by the Skidelskys is what people would do with so much more leisure. Some will probably educate themselves or pursue a hobby such as reading books and writing reviews. However, I suspect that most will spend the newly found free time eating, drinking, watching TV or fighting in bars, given that they won't be able to afford more expensive entertainments.

In New Jersey in 2002 I once met a garage owner who was about 60 years old; he said that he had previously been a Madison Avenue executive, which made him rich. I asked him, "Why do you still work?" He answered, "And what would I do? Stay home and look at my wife?"(less)

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Sep 29, 2012 Lauren rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nonfiction

Really enjoyed the short history of philosophy presented in the first several chapters and the critique of pursuing "happiness." Also liked the outline of the seven parts of what makes the good life. However, wanted this book to be more meaningful on a personal level, i.e., What can I do, right now, to pursue the good life? It touched on this, but the last quarter of the book shifted to the state and potential policy changes it could make to promote the good life. I understand the importance of...more

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Feb 12, 2013 Andrea rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2013_read_list, economics, nonfiction, philosophy-deep-thoughts, spirituality-religion, 0-kindle-book

An interesting combination of philosophy, economics and social history, this book was an interesting, but very conceptually dense read. I read fast and it took me over 2 weeks to get through this one a few morsels at a time. The central question is that of what is needed for “good life”. In exploring this, the authors examine the Keynesian conceit that technology and advances would eventually reduce the working hours needed to no more than 10 or 15 hours a week. Clearly this has not happened, bu...more

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Oct 19, 2012 B A rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: İngilizce-english

If I had the chance I would quit reading it in the first 50 pages...yet I have to translate it and it is getting on my nerves! It is full of baseless assumptions, foolishly bold generalizations, boring ordinary proposals... I hate how it evaluates today with centuries old values/traditions or constantly comes back to religion. I don't see the point in talking about religion that much as if religion (as an institution) is free from greed, lust for power and oppression. In short it is waste of tim...more

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Oct 03, 2012 Sara Wilbourne rated it 4 of 5 stars

A wake up call to the leaders of the western economies and a stark account of the future for developing ones. Learned, clear, and deeply humane the Basic Goods described by the authors speak to our hearts minds and wallets. Their proposals are radical but the cost to future generations of us not walking them out in economic and social policy can already be seen and felt In every town and city in Western Europe. Can we make the politicians step up and take on this challenge? That is the question...more

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Nov 24, 2012 Paul rated it 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed the synergy of philosophy and economies, since both are favored topics of mind. The two authors come from different backgrounds, one a strong Keynesian and the other having authored a book on philosophy. The arguments and writing style was on the threshold of becoming overloaded with wordiness (hardly a surprise for the philosophy sections), but well-organized into chapters. I find myself in agreement with the authors' general outline of seven basic goods (health, security, respect, pe...more

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Aug 12, 2012 Nicholas rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book is thought-provoking and interesting, but can be fairly hard work especially the middle of the book which is mainly philosophy.

I am generally sympathetic to the argument presented - that capitalism is ultimately a senseless system. I think they are also right to focus on the concept of insatiability and the problems it causes.

The problem I have with the argument is that what they claim is needed for the good life can't really be delivered by government action. The obvious implication i...more

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Jan 05, 2013 Johannes Ardiant rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Interesting insights into the reason on why Keynes' prediction was only partially fulfilled. Keynes predicted that, "the standard of life in progressive countries one hundred years hence will be between four and eight times as high as it is today," and therefore, three working hours a day would be enough "to satisfy the old Adam in us." Today's GDP per capita has been much as Keynes expected. However, our working hour doesn't really go down to his prediction.

The assumption underlying the predict...more

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Sep 12, 2012 Nancy Schober rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Hey there! I think I've found the cure for jet-lag ... reading economics. This guy sure likes big words ... but why would someone use 'dialectic' instead of the word 'logic'?

I'm still waiting for the part where they tell me how to want less...

Well at the end they came up with some pie-in-the sky/castles in the air Ivory Towered tenured academic ideas as solutions. Not.Very.Useful.

And I was highly offended by their first choice of a way out of this greedy/capitalistic mess as being the ideology o...more

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Oct 16, 2012 Toula rated it 3 of 5 stars

Aristotle said something to this effect :Let us assume that there is a good life, and that money is merely a means to its enjoyment !

This book was very thick, perhaps too wordy, some filler, and some philosophical points I just did not agree with.

One of the other reviewers suggested that an author by the name of Deidre McCloskey does a much better job explaining how much is enough. I am going to look her up.

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Mar 24, 2013 Ed rated it 4 of 5 stars

I enjoyed this economics and philosophy riff around the thinking of John Maynard Keynes and the issue of how much material wealth we need to be happy, to live the good life. Written by a father and son team, the father author of the standard three volume Life of Keynes, is deep in the right places and I think comes to some interesting data based but thoughtful conclusions.

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Jun 17, 2012 !Tæmbuŝu marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: economics, ebook-available

KOBOBOOKS

Reviewed by The Guardian (15 June 2012), The Guardian (29 Jun 2012), The Independent (7 Jul 2012), The Independent (29 Jul 2012)

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Sep 15, 2012 Kevin Hollins rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The main thrust of the book is interesting and timely, particularly as so many are struggling with the new reality that economic life has radically changed. For that perspective-seeking "time out" alone it is worth reading. However, towards the end the authors delve into policy prescriptions to help cure what they (and likely most buyers of the book) perceive as misdirected desires, and it's there that they lost me. All of the policy prescriptions were government directed, top down proposals, w...more

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May 07, 2013 Cristobal rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a seemingly simple book at first but once you get started it makes you think deeply about this "simple" on the surface issues. At heart resides whether our norm of consumerism is correct and if not what is the alternative and how do we get there? And it goes deeper still by questioning what is a "good" life and is it something we can define for all. An important book to rethink our goals in life and even more important for those of us with young children and aiming to give them direction...more

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Apr 13, 2013 Abdulrahman rated it 5 of 5 stars

Excellent book, an amazing mix between philosophy, economics and politics. Some chapters are too philosophic and difficult to read, but overall the book is excellent and worth reading.

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May 15, 2013 Hugo Messer rated it 2 of 5 stars

Somehow i had a hard time getting through the book. Although the topic attracted me a lot, i found it a bit too much theory and too much macro economics

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Mar 29, 2013 Geoff rated it 5 of 5 stars

It is difficult to arrive at a persuasive argument to both explain and attempt to "turn the tide" in insatiable consumption. The authors manage to do so.

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Oct 03, 2012 Sara Wilbourne rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

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Feb 22, 2013 Finbarr Carroll rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: ideas

Very wide ranging discussion,focused on economics.

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Oct 14, 2012 Bob Ackerley rated it 5 of 5 stars

Needs to be read by everyone!

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Apr 04, 2013 Dkujawinski rated it 3 of 5 stars

Interesting in general, but then there was this rant against environmentalism that seemed to come out of nowhere. In the end, that last chapter had some good suggestions and the first few chapters had an interesting history of what "the good life" meant.

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About Robert Skidelsky

Lord Skidelsky is Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick. His three volume biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received numerous prizes, including the Lionel Gelber Prize for International Relations and the Council on Foreign Relations Prize for International Relations. He is the author of the The World After Communism (1995) (American ed...more Lord Skidelsky is Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at the University of Warwick. His three volume biography of the economist John Maynard Keynes (1983, 1992, 2000) received numerous prizes, including the Lionel Gelber Prize for International Relations and the Council on Foreign Relations Prize for International Relations. He is the author of the The World After Communism (1995) (American edition called The Road from Serfdom). He was made a life peer in 1991, and was elected Fellow of the British Academy in 1994. He is chairman of the Govenors of Brighton College

Robert Skidelsky was born on 25 April 1939 in Harbin, Manchuria. His parents were British subjects, but of Russian ancestry. His father worked for the family firm, L. S. Skidelsky, which leased the Mulin coalmine from the Chinese government. When war broke out between Britain and Japan in December 1941, he and his parents were interned first in Manchuria then Japan, but released in exchange for Japanese internees in England.

From 1953 to 1958, he was a boarder at Brighton College (of which he is now chairman of the board of governors). He went on to read history at Jesus College, Oxford, and from 1961 to 1969, he was successively research student, senior student, and research fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford. In 1967, he published his first book, Politicians and the Slump, Labour Government of 1929-31, based on his D.Phil dissertation. The book explores the ways in which British politicians handled the Great Depression.

During a two year research fellowship at the British Academy, he began work in his biography of Sir Oswald Mosley (published in 1975) and published English Progressive Schools (1969). In 1970, he became an Associate Professor at the School of Advanced International Studies, John Hopkins University. But the controversy surrounding the publication of his biography of Sir Oswald Mosley - in which he was felt to have let Mosley off too lightly - led John Hopkins University to refuse him tenure. Oxford University also proved unwilling to give him a permanent post.

In 1978, he was appointed Professor of International Studies at the University of Warwick, where he has since remained, though joining the Economics Department as Professor Political Economy in 1990. He is currently Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University.

The first volume of his biography of John Maynard Keynes, Hopes Betrayed, 1883-1920, was published in 1983. The second volume, The Economist as Saviour, 1920-1937 (1992) won the Wolfson Prize for History. The third volume, Fighting for Britain, 1937-1946 (2000) won the Duff Cooper Prize, the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Biography, the Lionel Gelber Prize for International Relations and the Arthur Ross Council on Foreign Relations Prize for International Relations.

Since 2003, he has been a non-executive director of the mutual fund manager, Janus Capital and Rusnano Capital; from 2008-10 he sat on the board of Sistema JSC. He is a director of the Moscow School of Political Studies and was the founder and executive secretary of the UK/Russia Round Table. Since 2002, he has been chairman of the Centre for Global Studies. In 2010, he joined the Advisory Board of the Institute of New Economic Thinking.

He writes a monthly column for Project Syndicate, "Against the Current", which is syndicated in newspapers all over the world. His account of the current economic crisis, Keynes: The Return of the Master, was published by Penguin Allen Lane in September 2009. A short history of twentieth-century Britain was published by Random House in the volume A World by Itself: A History of the British Isles edited by Jonathan Clark in January 2010. He is now in the process of writing How Much is Enough? The Economics of the Good Life jointly with his son Edward Skidelsky.(less)

More about Robert Skidelsky...

Books by Robert Skidelsky

John Maynard Keynes: 1883-1946: Economist, Philosopher, Statesman

John Maynard Keynes: Hopes Betrayed, 1883-1920 (Keynesian Studies)

John Maynard Keynes: Volume 2: The Economist as Savior, 1920-1937

John Maynard Keynes: Volume 3: Fighting for Freedom, 1937-1946

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“Experience has taught us that material wants know no natural bounds, that they will expand without end unless we consciously restrain them. Capitalism rests precisely on this endless expansion of wants. That is why, for all its success, it remains so unloved. It has given us wealth beyond measure, but has taken away the chief benefit of wealth: the consciousness of having enough.” — 3 people liked it

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