Economic Growth and Happiness Reassessing the Easterlin.PPTVIP

* * * * * * * * * * * * Now you might think that talking about economic development and love is a good way to close. Perhaps, but it may undermine the more serious message here. * * Note: Our pain data covers 98.5% of the world’s population. * * NOT: asking what happiness means ARE: challenging conventional wisdom about happiness ARE: establishing foundational facts We all know the facts about what has happened to income inequality in the U.S. (rising sharply) This paper: New fact: happiness inequality is declining Given that we will be juxtaposing these two facts: it is useful to review what we know about the link between income and happiness * * * * * In 1974, Richard Easterlin wrote a paper titled “Does Economic Growth Improve the Human Lot? Some Empirical Evidence”. This paper launched a literature of economists using subjective well-being data to assess the policy The first part of the title “Does Economic Growth improve the Human Lot” points to his ambitions The second part, “some empirical evidence” hints at his approach: He analyzes data from surveys asking people how happy they are, and this paper launched the economic analysis of happiness data. In recent decades, that literature has greatly expanded to hundreds of papers The “Easterlin Paradox” is easily the most cited finding in the economics of happiness, and the 1974 paper also launched a thirty-year research program for Richard Easterlin exploring the link between income and happiness. FLIP TO NEXT SLIDE HERE So, what is the Easterlin Paradox? 3 comparisons of the link between income happiness appear to give different answers Between rich and poor people in a society at a point in time: Strong evidence that income matters As far as I am aware, in every representative national survey ever done a significant bivariate relationship between happiness and income has been found.” - Easterlin 1974 Between rich and poor countries: No evidence, or weak evidence that income matters the happiness differ