[mikepmalai]

> To each his own, but would someone really want to keep cleaning professionally even if they were wealthy? I could easily seeing less-than-profitable but creative hobbies being way more interesting for hypothetical cleaners who were wealthy and wanted to stay busy.

I felt the same way until I actually met a wealthy cleaner. All I can say is never underestimate the power of habit and the difficulty of breaking routines.

I used to intern at a small investment manager years ago where one of the clients was a cleaning lady. Every couple weeks she would come into the office to deposit a portion of her modest housecleaning income into her investment account. I didn't think much of it until I found out she was actually a multi-millionaire. This cleaner had been investing with the investment manager for years and (at ~20% annual returns) her small contributions compounded into millions of dollars. It was pretty mind blowing. Why didn't she just retire!? She just loved her job and the routine...

Anyway, the best part is she refers her high net worth customers all the time to the fund and they all sheepishly try to explain how they heard about the fund from their cleaning lady. Little did they know that their house cleaner was actually richer than them.

[davidw]

Cute story, but I'd put money on people doing cleaning work, statistically, being happier doing their hobby rather than cleaning.

Not all cleaning people work for investment managers that cut them in on sweet deals. Truth be told, I would guess that those are probably a minority.

[mikepmalai]

I'd put money on most cleaners not having hobbies =) (Sorry couldn't help myself...I come from a family of very blue collar folks and it's a running joke that your hobby is sleep)

My main point is it's hard to break years of routine/habit. If someone has done the same thing for 20 years, I don't expect them to suddenly change. Even when change would bring greater happiness over the long-term, I'm not betting against the comfort of status quo.

[salemh]

You are probably on to something with the lack of "retirement" (US, business and academia). Also, the change may lead to less happiness, from breaking such a long-term "routine" (I would say "life").

[mikepmalai]

It seems like with enough time we become institutionalized to a certain way of life and will reshape our happiness to fit perfectly to that world.

Oddly, first time I saw the world this way was after watching Shawshank Redemption as a kid and seeing Brooks killing himself after he was freed. From that point on, a lot of the seemingly irrational decisions people make made a lot more sense to me.