standard of living and quality of life are mutually exclusive?

Answer 1

No, they are closely related. High standard of living means, among other things, access to indoor plumbing and safe drinking water, which in turn mean greatly diminished exposure to infections. Along with the discovery of antibiotics, this led to an increase in life expectancy from 40 to 60...

The reason you are posing your question probably has something to do with environmental impact of the modern industrial society. The problem, unfortunately, is not new and not exactly related to the standard of living; many ancient civilizations from Mesopotamia to South America managed to ruin their habitats while reaching a very modest standard of living...

Answer 2

No, but they are not always linked very closely. Mother Teresa had a pretty low standard of living, but her quality of life was high, because she chose a low standard of living in order to do what made her happy, which was helping the poorest of the poor. Other people have a high standard of living, and have a good quality of life because of it. Bill Gates lives like a king, and he is able to give back to the world by funding vaccinations for kids, which makes him happy and gives him a good quality of life. Other people are unhappy and have a low quality of life even though they have a high standard of living. Howard Hughes had tons of money but lived in misery because he was mentally a basket case. I would not say they are mutually exclusive, but I would not make any attempt to link them unless you know a lot about the person you are talking about.