Rising Happiness in Nations 1946–2004: A Reply to Easterlin

Springer Science and Business Media LLC - Tập 79 - Trang 421-436 - 2006
Ruut Veenhoven1, Michael Hagerty1
1Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

Tóm tắt

The ‘Easterlin paradox’ holds that economic growth does not add to the quality-of-life and that this appears in the fact that average happiness in nations has not risen in the last few decades. The latest trend data show otherwise. Average happiness has increased slightly in rich nations and considerably in the few poor nations for which data are available. Since longevity has also increased, the average number of happy life years has increased at an unprecedented rate since the 1950s.

Tài liệu tham khảo

Carroll J. (2004). Americans Personal Satisfaction Gallup Polls News Service, 4 January 2005 . Gallup Organization, Washington DC, USA Chin-Hon-Foei S (1989). Life-satisfaction in the EC-countries 1975–1984. In: Hagenaars, A. (eds) Did the Crisis Really Hurt? Effects of the 1980–82 Economic Recession on Satisfaction, Mental Health and Mortality, pp. Universitaire Pers Rotterdam, The Netherlands Easterlin R.A. (1974). Does economic growth improve the human lot?. In: David, Paul A. and Reder, Melvin W. (eds) Nations and Households in Economic Growth: Essays in Honor of Mozes Abramowitz , pp 89–125. Academic press, New York Easterlin R.A. (1995). Will raising the income of all increase the happiness of all?. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 27: 35–48 Easterlin R.A. (2003). Explaining happiness. Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences 100: 11176–11183 Easterlin R.A. (2005). Feeding the illusion of growth and happiness: A reply to Hagerty and Veenhoven. Social Indicators Research 74: 429–443 Frijters P., Haisken-DeNew J/P. and Shields M.A. (2004). Money does matter: Evidence from␣increasing real income and life-satisfaction in East Germany following Reunification. The American Economic Review 94: 730–740 Gallup Brain, Web archive of public opinion polls since the 1930s http://brain.gallup.com Graham C (2004). Does happiness pay? An exploration based on panel data from Russia. Journal of Economic Behavior 55: 319–342 Hagerty M.R. and Veenhoven R. (2003). Wealth and happiness revisited: Growing national income does go with greater happiness. Social Indicators Research 64: 1–27 Jones J.M. (2004). Americans: Life is Good and will Only Improve. Gallup Poll News Services, 17 February 2004 . The Gallup Organization, Washington DC, USA Linn G.J. and McGranahan D.A. (1980). Personal disruption, social integration, subjective well-being and predisposition toward the use of counseling services. American Journal of Community Psychology 8: 87–100 Maddison, A.: 1995, Monitoring the World Economy, 1820–1992 (OECD Paris) Saad L. (2004). A Nation of Happy People: Most Americans are happy and Satisfied with their Life. Gallup Poll News Services, 5 January 2004. . Gallup Organization, Washington DC, USA Veenhoven R. (1993). Happiness in Nations. RISBO, Rotterdam, The Netherlands Veenhoven R. (1996). Happy Life expectancy: A comprehensive measure of quality-of-life in nations. Social Indicators research 39: 1–58 Veenhoven, R.: 2005a, World Database of Happiness: Continuous register of research on subjective appreciation of life. Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands: http:// worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl Veenhoven, R.: 2005b Average happiness in 90 nations 1990–2000. RankReport 2004/1c, World Database of Happiness, http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl Veenhoven, R.: 2005c, Trend average happiness in nations: 1946–2004. Trendreport 2005–1d, World Database of Happiness; http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl Veenhoven, R.: 2005d, Trend Happy Life Years in nations: 1946–2002. Trendreport 2005–2a, World Database of Happiness; http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl Veenhoven, R.: 2005e, Trend inequality of happiness in nations: 1946–2004. Trendreport 2005–1d, World Database of Happiness; http://worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl Veenhoven R. (2005f). Is life getting better?. European Journal of Psychology 10: 330–343 Veenhoven R. (2005g). Apparent quality-of-life in nations: how long and happy people live. Social Indicators research 71: 61–86 Veenhoven R. (2005h). Return of inequality in modern society? Test by trend in dispersion of life-satisfaction across time and nations. Journal of Happiness Studies 6: 457–487 Veenhoven, R., W.M. Kalmijn: 2006, How happy is ‘very’ happy? International scaling study, Research report in preparation