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The increasing cost of happiness.

ABSTRACT: A fundamental question for society is how much happiness does a dollar buy? The accepted view among economists and psychologists is that income has diminishing marginal returns on happiness: money and happiness increase together up to a point after which there is relatively little further gain. In this paper we estimate the relationship between income and subjective wellbeing over a 19-year period focusing on where the greatest change in the marginal return on income occurs and whether this change point has shifted over time. We formally test for the presence of a change point as well as temporal changes in the relationship between income and affective wellbeing (happiness), and income and cognitive wellbeing (life satisfaction), using household economic data from Australia between 2001 and 2019. The results indicate that the change point between affective wellbeing and income has increased over those 19 years faster than inflation (i.e., cost of living). This suggests that inequalities in income may be driving increasing inequities in happiness between the rich and the poor, with implications for health and recent government policy-goals to monitor and improve wellbeing.

SUBMITTER: Morris RW

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8551651 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The increasing cost of happiness.

Morris R W RW Kettlewell N N Glozier N N

SSM - population health 20211022

A fundamental question for society is how much happiness does a dollar buy? The accepted view among economists and psychologists is that income has diminishing marginal returns on happiness: money and happiness increase together up to a point after which there is relatively little further gain. In this paper we estimate the relationship between income and subjective wellbeing over a 19-year period focusing on where the greatest change in the marginal return on income occurs and whether this chan ...[more]

PMID: 34746360

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Project description:BackgroundWe aimed to examine the effect of ambient air pollution at the district level on adolescents' happiness and their change in happiness over time in a cohort sample from Taiwan.MethodA cohort from the Taiwan Youth Project was evaluated. The adolescents (n = 2571) were in the 7th grade (mean age = 14.3 years) when the study was initiated and resided in 40 districts in three cities and counties in northern Taiwan. We examined the effects of the concentration level of air pollution, including PM2.5, PM10, and NO2, at the district level on adolescents' happiness and their change in happiness over time (7th to 9th grade). Due to the high correlations of the three pollutants, we examined each separately with similar covariates. The analyses were based on both multilevel modeling and latent growth curve modeling.ResultsHigher concentration levels of each of the three air pollutants measured were associated with adolescent happiness such that a higher level of concentration was related to lower levels of adolescents' happiness. These results were observed after controlling for important individual- and district-level covariates. However, further analyses did not reveal that the concentration level of air pollution was associated with the change in happiness in the study period (after 3 years). Some sensitivity checks (e.g., adjusting district size) did not change the substantive results.ConclusionMany previous studies have shown the influence of air pollution on physical health and negative emotions, but only a few using adult samples have shown that air pollution is inversely related to positive wellbeing. This study may be the first to examine the effects of air pollution on adolescents' positive affect. Our results echo recent research on the consequent health burden of air pollution. Given that positive affect has been linked to future adult health, the results of the current study provide empirical grounds for early intervention concerning environmental factors.

Dataset Information

The increasing cost of happiness.

Publications

The increasing cost of happiness.

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