Economic Growth Evens Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys

Andrew Clark, Sarah Flèche and Claudia Senik ()
Additional contact information
Claudia Senik: UP4 - Université Paris-Sorbonne, PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement, PSE - Paris-Jourdan Sciences Economiques - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: In spite of the great U-turn that saw income inequality rise in Western countries in the 1980s, happiness inequality has fallen in countries that have experienced income growth (but not in those that did not). Modern growth has reduced the share of both the "very unhappy" and the "perfectly happy." Lower happiness inequality is found both between and within countries, and between and within individuals. Our cross-country regression results suggest that the extension of various public goods helps to explain this greater happiness homogeneity. This new stylized fact arguably comes as a bonus to the Easterlin paradox, offering a somewhat brighter perspective for developing countries.

Keywords: happiness; inequality; development; Easterlin paradox; economic growth (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016-09
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01383827v1
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (31)

Published in Review of Income and Wealth, 2016, 62 (3), pp.405-419. ⟨10.1111/roiw.12190⟩

Downloads: (external link)
https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01383827v1/document (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: Economic Growth Evens Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2016)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2016)
Working Paper: Economic growth evens out happiness: evidence from six surveys (2015)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic growth evens-out happiness: evidence from six surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
Working Paper: Economic Growth Evens-Out Happiness: Evidence from Six Surveys (2014)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01383827

DOI: 10.1111/roiw.12190

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().