People Paid by the Hour Are Happier

A new scientific research has determined that people who are paid by the hour are a lot happier when it comes to money than those paid only once a month, on payday. The research, which was conducted by researchers at the Stanford University and the University of Toronto, in Canada, suggests that this correlation may be rooted in the fact that people being paid more often tend to have a firmer grip on their own value and worth, and that this may contribute significantly to their personal happiness levels.

“If you are paid by the hour or account for your time on a timesheet, you begin to see the world in terms of money and in terms of economic evaluation. To the extent that time becomes like money and money becomes more salient, the linkage between how much you earn and your happiness increases,” explains the new findings Jeffrey Pfeffer. He is the Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, PhysOrg reports.

The researchers add that people paid by the hour tend to pay more attention to precisely how much their time is worth. If the amount of money they are paid is sufficient for their efforts, then they tend to make various types of comparisons between the value of their time and the amount of happiness they experience. This is seldom the case for workers paid only once or twice per month. These people worry that their money will not suffice from one month to the next, and have to carefully plan their spendings. This is very detrimental to their overall levels of happiness, because it adds a lot of stress to their lives.

“If they're thinking about their income, then all of a sudden, even people who are paid by salary become much more like hourly paid workers; they think of their time in terms of money, the connection between income and happiness goes up and they become economic evaluators of their use of time in their life,” Pfeffer reveals. Details of this investigation appear in the December 1, 2009, issue of the respected scientific journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. “How organizations pay people has profound effects outside of that organizational context. If you're paid by the hour, you come to see your time in a certain way that doesn't change when you walk out of your employer's door,” the expert concludes.