> I make less than most of my friends and they, by virtue of independent wealth or higher income or elite status, are significantly happier than me.

I'm not really in the "money is irrelevant" bucket but this doesn't look like a monetary problem you're facing here.

Seems like you overtuned things and hit a lot of diminishing returns, where you worked hard but didn't see much for it, but now you assume people who work less hard have seen even less, but that's not actually always the case because well we are told the world is unfair quite often, yet in cases like work we for some reason decide not to believe it.

I know for a fact people who have worked less hard have more...but again, mostly at better schools, or have wealthier backgrounds or are just plain luckier than me.

I guess the real problem is I'm still a failure no matter how much effort I put in.

Everyone else I know was in the same situation. We spent 4 years partying, hanging out, and having a good time.

I'm aware that it is a position of privilege to be able to say that university is a place to find yourself, but it's not a position of immense privilege at all in New Zealand, or most of the western world for that matter.

These days, I earn enough that I generally don't worry about money. I check my bank balance on payday to see how much I've got, and don't worry about it for the next month. I'm no happier than I was when I had to check my balance every time I went to the shops, when I had $5 to last me 2 days to payday. Sure, I'm less stressed, but I'm not happier.