Reflecting on 2011

Did you get healthier, wealthier or wiser in the past year?

Another year is drawing to a rapid close and it’s around this time most of us start trying to figure out whether we’re better off than we were last year. It’s important not to let hangovers from the Christmas party circuit, exhaustion from 12 months of hard labour and other trivia such as the result of the Rugby World Cup or the ­election colour your thinking.

Businesses benchmark their success or failure with the cold, hard statistics of bottom-line profit and loss. Best not to try this mode, as a quick look at your bank account will probably reveal little or no change to its weighty overdraft since this time last year. Equally, if by “bottom line” you mean the circumference of your arse, it is probably best not measured after another year of gluttony.

If you are truly boring, you could apply Human Resources techniques, such as setting yourself key performance indicators (KPIs) on New Year’s Day, then checking 12 months on to see if you’ve hit those benchmarks. However, in my case that is about as successful as making New Year’s resolutions to stop smoking, drinking and loafing.

Personal KPIs are quickly forgotten or abandoned in the face of the overwhelming reality of everyday life.

Your own level of happiness is probably the best guide to knowing whether you’re better off in life, but often it’s hard to assess if you’re a happier bunny than you were last December.

The OECD helpfully publishes inter­national survey statistics showing such things as 77% of New Zealanders are satisfied with their life – much higher than the OECD average of 59%. But what if you’re one of the dissatisfied 23%? Curiously, that figure is almost exactly equivalent to the Labour Party’s vote at the last election. Would you be happier and more satisfied if you voted National or Green, instead?

Last year an international Gallup poll ranked Kiwis No 1 in the world for happiness on a day-to-day basis. However, you have to be wary of some of these studies. A few years back North Korea issued a Global Happiness Index that rated China top, itself a close second and the US dead last; I couldn’t even find New Zealand on the table.

In May no less than the august body of the New Zealand Treasury announced it would try to monitor and measure levels of our happiness, trust and the value of leisure in respect of our living standards. Whenever Treasury gets around to publishing the results, it will be interesting because my guess is happiness has little or nothing to do with wealth. New Zealand’s GDP is near terminal, our wages among the lowest in the OECD and we work some of the longest hours of any countries it surveys.

I’m hoping happiness is in direct inverse proportion to wealth, in which case I am living in a constantly joyous state close to pure ecstasy. Speaking of ecstasy, would drugs help? Probably not, as they, like booze, provide only temporary mood elevation, deplete both your energy and your bank account and, in all likelihood, can result in a lengthy period of incarceration that will definitely not contribute to your overall level of happiness – unless you happen to fancy playing mamas and papas in the communal shower block with a large hairy tattooed cellmate called Big Manny.

What we are trying to do is measure “progress”, a hopefully upward movement in our personal circumstances. This implies we are, somehow, on a journey. I’ve always distrusted people who say trite things like, “It’s about the journey”, as this implies they have no idea of the destination. I want a GPS telling me where I am and how far it is to Nirvana – and I don’t mean Kurt Cobain, as that would mean transiting Courtney Love to oblivion.

If we exclude wealth as a measurement (although selflessly I will continue to buy Lotto Powerball just to check out the effects of riches should my numbers come in), what else could be used?

Improved health is a definite indicator. Let’s tick that one off. The love of a good partner in life? Tick. A happy family? Check. Adequate food? More than adequate judging by my steadily expanding waistline. Shelter? Yep, got that – even if it does need a bit of a tart-up. Leisure time? In my case it’s increasingly difficult to tell where leisure ends and work begins, although the word “leisure” is a worry. Does it mean I have to start buying leisurewear? There is an age beyond which Lycra and tight knit fabrics are definitely not de rigueur.

Still, applying these criteria I’d venture to suggest, smugly, that I’m better off than last year. How did you go?