We all know money can't buy happiness. But according to a recent study, there may be a loophole.

我们都知道，金钱不能买到幸福。但根据最近的一项研究，这话可能有漏洞。

A team of researchers finds that shelling out for services that save time can bring greater feelings of life satisfaction than, say, simply buying more stuff. The results appear in the Proceedings¹ of the National Academy of Sciences.

一组研究人员发现，与其花钱购物，不如付钱购买能节省时间的服务，后者更能为生活带来更高的满足感。该项研究结果发表在《美国国家科学院院刊》上。

It's safe to say that most of us regularly feel crunched² for time. So much so that we are experiencing what Ashley Whillans of the Harvard Business School, the lead author of the study, describes as a "time famine." And like any famine, this chronic³ lack of time takes its toll⁴ on our health.

可以确切地说，我们大多数人都经常感到时间不够用。那么，我们正在经历"时间饥荒"，这一术语由该研究的首席作者、哈佛商学院Ashley Whillans提出。"跟其他所有饥荒一样，长期时间紧张会对我们的健康造成损害。"

"When we feel like our to-do lists are longer than the hours that we have time in the day to complete them, we can feel like our life is spiraling out of control, thereby⁵ undermining our personal well-being⁶."

"当我们感觉完成任务清单需要的时间比一天中的可用时间要长时，可能会觉得生活失控，从而破坏个人幸福。"

Well, if time is money, Whillans and her team wondered whether money that's used to buy time could offer some relief. Like paying someone else to clean the house, mow⁷ the lawn, or deliver the groceries.

额，如果时间等于金钱，Whillans和她的团队想弄清楚，用于购买时间的金钱，能否给人带来安慰。比如付钱请别人打扫房子、付钱修剪草坪或者送杂货。

To find out, the researchers asked more than 6,000 people from the U.S., Canada, Denmark, and the Netherlands to rate their overall satisfaction with life, and to estimate how much money they lay out each month to outsource unenjoyable daily tasks or otherwise purchase some time off.

为了一探究竟，研究人员请来自美国、加拿大、丹麦和荷兰的6000多人，并对他们的生活满意度进行评估，然后估算他们每个月会花多少钱来将日常琐事通过外包服务解决，或者通过其他方式花钱以节省时间。

And they found that respondents who willingly swap⁸ funds for free time also report feeling more content—regardless of their income or how many hours they work each week.

他们发现，不管他们收入多少或者每周工作多少小时，那些愿意用金钱来换取自由时光的人，同时也是满足感较强的人

To follow up, the researchers conducted a smaller experiment in which they gave volunteers forty bucks⁹ to buy a little something for themselves. The same participants got another forty dollars that they were told to spend on something that would save them time.

为了进一步研究，研究人员进行了一项较小的实验：他们给志愿者40美元，让他们为自己买东西。然后再给其他人40美元，让他们将钱花在可以节省时间的事情上。

And again, buying time was more likely to elevate mood and alleviate¹⁰ anxiety.

实验结果再次显示，花钱节省时间更有可能让人提高情绪，缓解焦虑。

These findings may be hard for some people to, well, buy:

不过，这些结果可能还是很难让一些人花钱节省时间：

"Even in a sample of 850 millionaires, just over half of our respondents spent money to buy themselves time. These findings link to a broader literature suggesting that we do not always spend money in ways that promote happiness."

"即使在对850个百万富翁进行的调查中，也只有超过一半的人会花钱来节省时间。这些发现恰恰与一个更广泛的文献有关，这个文献表明，人们并不总是为提升幸福感而花钱。"

Even when we should know better.

甚至在我们知道那样做会变得更好的情况下。

"Personally I know that when I recently moved to a new city I had a lot of errands to run. I had to let my own data convince me that buying time would make my life easier, less stressful and happier."

"就个人而言，当我最近搬到一个新城市时，我知道我有很多事情要做。我必须让数据来说服我，花钱购买时间会让我的生活更轻松、压力更少、更快乐。"