A Different Kind of Recession - HBS Student Reflects on Visit to India

http://www.zacharyclayton.com/2009/03/04/a-different-kind-of-recession/

by JoelSutherland • 17 years ago

40 15 17 years ago

rjprins• 17 years ago

Peoples minds work on such a strong relative level.. You can be upper-middle-class in California and kill yourself from depression. You can live in a slum and work all day and be happy (Theoretically that is, if they weren't constantly reminded by a skyline, TV, commercials and rich tourists of their relative position. In fact, commercials are designed to lower your happiness, as they essentially try to show that life can be better.)

Not only happiness, but truth is relative for people. Exploring boundaries (like travelling) is the only way to be able to better position and evaluate standpoints on any subject.

The minds natural tendency to zoom in must be countered, consciously and regularly. For us, (I assume the people in Dharavi are not reading this) this can also definately be source of happiness and a way to set your focus on the right kind of things in your life.

vinutheraj• 17 years ago

I have always been intrigued by this facet of humankind, that people who are so poor can live life so happily, thinking about the small things in life. Maybe its about choices, the more choices and freedom we have, the more we miss the things we could have been, or could have done ?!

whughes• 17 years ago

Making generalizations about rich and poor is very dangerous. It may well be cultural, and many areas which are poor happen to have that cultural attribute. Perhaps it is also related to media exposure. I doubt that happiness is directly related to wealth or lack of wealth. Obviously there are many happy middle-class people and many sad poor people.

selva• 17 years ago

An insightful talk by Dan Gilbert on this http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_...

g__g2• 17 years ago

Yes you can live a depressed life in California and you can also live and work in a slum and be happy. But I don't quite agree with the point that constant reminders of a skyline, TV etc in anyways dampen their spirit or make them less happy, on the contrary I think it motivates them. The relative differences show these people what they can be or want to be. I know of slums in other Indian cities as well, not many of them can boast about "running an industry" or the number of television sets as compared to dharavi(the one in Mumbai). What is evident is that in the more developed and prosperous cities, the happiness quotient of people in slums is generally higher as compared to slums in other less-developed cities.

That being said, I am not suggesting that prosperous cities lead to better slums. In fact there isn't a larger difference between the rich and poor anywhere in the world than there is in Mumbai. Poverty needs to be tackled and there are a lot of NGO's working towards this. All I'm trying to say is that the relative difference these people see around them does not make them feel less happier, it's a reality they live with and aspire to reach.

ojbyrne2• 17 years ago

The "recession" reference seems misleading. Poverty is kind of timeless.

old-gregg3• 17 years ago

Do we have to supply every submission with a mandatory comment regarding the title?

I mean that was your first reaction, right? After reading the post the voice inside told you "gee, I wish he picked another title, I better post a comment about it?"

And by the way, I found the title perfectly fitting and clever: we can bitch and moan about deteriorating US roads and infrastructure, about property values in California going down by 41.3% all we want, but that's far from another, raw meaning of "low".

rms• 17 years ago

It's a feature that we'll hopefully get added to the codebase eventually --- community revoting on titles. Bad titles are really annoying.

dawie• 17 years ago

Agreed that recession is misleading in the title.

I recently got back from India and I didn't make it into Dharavi. One thing that I found though is the fact that India didn't get the Memo that there is a world recession going on.

They are still building and expanding like crazy. On one Island I was they where building 3 new dive shops...

g__g2• 17 years ago

That is so true. I live here but even to me it seems that the entire county's under construction!

jonnycoder• 17 years ago

I've been to Mexico and India (Bangalore) and it provides a wake up call on how lucky I am to have been born in California, obtained my degree and get a job at a fortune 50 company. Travel is a good way to get out of your shell and experience what it's like outside your own little world.

chiffonade• 17 years ago

Wow, an entire blog post dedicated to white guilt.

A Different Kind of Recession - HBS Student Reflects on Visit to India

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