Historically, the concept of "pursuit of happiness" was more often meant to mean "satisfaction of basic needs", rather than blind competitive entertainment of fantasies that people wouldn't know about without advertising.... ;)

How we teach this to children is really context-sensitive. "Happiness" for Tom Sawyer was a rat on a string. "Happiness" for today's kids requires some kind of engine, a trip to Utah or Florida and a storage garage the rest of the year....

So-called "adults" are little different. Comically oversized people driving comically oversized vehicles on comically oversized highways at Road Runner speeds while placing bets on their comically oversized phone for the next comically oversized sportsball game.

Life is a cartoon now.