The Short Road to Happiness

I would like to talk about happiness. But first, let's talk books.

In the 21st-century bookselling world, many books have become commodities. The same book can be bought in California or Vermont or Texas. It can be bought at a price club, by mail order, online, at a big box chain, at a specialty store or at a local independent. Does it matter where a reader gets this book? Does the transaction have any larger implications?

It's interesting to look at these questions in light of the "Local First" campaigns spreading across the country. Dozens of towns, cities and states are sprouting alliances of locally owned, independent business with the aim of raising people's awareness of the value of looking locally for goods and services.

The primary argument tends to be that spending money locally keeps money in the community, thereby strengthening it. This makes sense, as these companies all have local staff, lawyers, accountants and suppliers. Their owners and managers are right here, not in a far-off corporate headquarters. A study in Austin, Tex., revealed that more than three times the amount of money stayed in a town when it was spent at the local bookstore as opposed to a chain. Studies in Illinois and Maine back up this finding.

But there are many other reasons to support local businesses. Stores in downtowns—as many locally owned, independent businesses are—tend to be cheaper for their towns; they use fewer public goods and therefore fewer tax dollars. For instance, a study in Barnstable, Mass., found that a big box retailer "generated" a net deficit to the town of $468 per 1,000 square feet, whereas a specialty retailer produced a net annual return of $326 per 1,000 square feet.

Locally owned businesses draw tourists, too. Vermont's director of the department of tourism told me that a recent survey of tourists indicated that one of the primary reasons they come here is because of its distinctiveness. They don't want to shop at the same stores they have back home.

Also worthy of note is that small businesses give more to nonprofits than big businesses do. In fact, small businesses give more than twice as much per employee as large firms do.

There are numerous reasons that independent business alliances and "Local First" campaigns are resonating with Americans. Not least is that local ownership ensures that important business decisions are made locally by people who live in the community and who will feel the impacts of those decisions.

There is a compelling case to be made that diverting dollars to local businesses that would normally flow out of town makes economic, social and even environmental sense. As the economy limps along for working people, gas prices fluctuate and the insecurity of perpetual war festers, the intuitive aspect of this argument is gaining traction with people from all walks of life.

For me, these arguments hold substantial truth, but I worry more about the loss of the intangible human connections that exist in an environment rooted in knowledge of a particular place. There are no studies to assess the quiet damage to society as we lose our gathering places, our community centers.

Or perhaps there are.

I am reading the ARC of Bill McKibben's next book, Deep Economy (Times Books, Mar. 2007). In it he traces studies of human happiness over the decades and how our happiness has related to increased consumption. It turns out that while gross domestic product per person has tripled since 1950—while we have created the first society of mass affluence in the history of the world—our stated level of happiness has declined steadily. According to Americans, more and cheaper and faster are not necessarily better. McKibben points to local economies, rooted in community, as essential elements of a healthy 21st-century society.

A return to valuing and supporting community bodes well for the future of local bookstores. Shop local, be happy.