Psychologists (and renown happiness experts) Kennon Sheldon and Sonja Lyubomirsky argue in a recent paper that our hedonic adaption occurs for two reasons.
The use of hedonic quality modeling in adjusting the prices of goods and services has destroyed the concept of the CPI as a measure of out-of-pocket expenses.
Psychologists investigating eudaimonic versus hedonic types of happiness over the past five to 10 years have looked at each type's unique effects on physical and psychological health.
The pleasure that comes with, say, a good meal, an entertaining movie or an important win for one's sports team a feeling called "hedonic well-being" tends to be short-term and fleeting.
Researchers at San Diego State University who conducted the analysis pointed to increasing cultural emphasis in the U.S. on materialism and status, which emphasize hedonic happiness, and decreasing attention to community and meaning in life, as possible explanations.
The CPI also ignores the direct cost of property taxes--sure to go up as states and cities bail out underfunded pension plans--and subtracts the "hedonic" effects of regulations that increase quality of life, such as the added expense of pollution-reducing gasoline additives.