If you are studying economic growth, the standard of living and economic well-being, this is a hugely important article to read and I recommend it you in the strongest possible terms.
The Easterlin Paradox concerns whether we are happier and more contented as our living standards improve. In the mid 1970s Richard Easterlin drew attention to studies that showed that, although successive generations are usually more affluent that their parents or grandparents, people seemed to be no happier with their lives? It is an interesting paradox to study when you are writing about measuring economic welfare and the standard of living.
What is the Easterlin Paradox?
1) Within a society, rich people tend to be much happier than poor people.
2) But, rich societies tend not to be happier than poor societies (or not by much).
3) As countries get richer, they do not get happier.
2) But, rich societies tend not to be happier than poor societies (or not by much).
3) As countries get richer, they do not get happier.
Easterlin argued that life satisfaction does rise with average incomes but only up to a point. Beyond that the marginal gain in happiness declines.
Easterlin and others including Professor Richard Layard and Daniel Kahneman have spawned a huge amount of research into the economics of happiness and well-being - Layard in particular has written extensively on the economic and human costs of worsening mental health across a number of countries.
One of Easterlin’s conclusions was that relative income can weigh heavily on people’s minds.
Faced with this choice what would you rather have?
You get Rs 5,000 and a friend gets Rs 3,000
or
You get Rs10,000 and a friend gets Rs15,000
There is a continuous debate about whether we can actually get accurate and reasonably objective measures of our well-being. Clearly income is just one of many factors that influences how satisfied we are with our lives.
Questions:
1. Have you observed this phenomena around you?
2. How should we calculate Happiness?
3. What are the goods and services that should be valued more than just affluence / riches?
I am sure Semester - I students would participate in this debate and bring new reflections on this issue.
Blog Entry: Geof Riley
1. Have you observed this phenomena around you?
2. How should we calculate Happiness?
3. What are the goods and services that should be valued more than just affluence / riches?
I am sure Semester - I students would participate in this debate and bring new reflections on this issue.
Blog Entry: Geof Riley
An article from Richard Easterlin on the importance of well-being and happiness for policy-makers
24 comments:
What is most remarkable is how similar the forces driving happiness are in various countries, regardless of a nation's level of development. One thing that I believe is, people have a hard time adapting to, uncertainty. People seem to be much better at dealing with unpleasant certainty than with the uncertainty of how bad a particular health condition or economic crisis will get. But happiness can get as varied as the psychology of people,at different points of time in our lives, it ranges from excellence in being a competent student to stabilizing our career to family and health at the end which could again differ and hence we probably can never have a matrix to measure the same.
Good observation, Simrann.
Indeed, it is difficult to measure and have a centralized approach.
The matrix would involve the following:
what are the joys of life when you are rich?
what are the joys which are not enjoyable with affluence?
what are the joys that are accessible when you are poor?
what are the joys which are equally enjoyed by the rich and poor?
The nature of happiness / joy will be revealed when as a researcher collects the data from the society and finds the central tenancies of happiness among the rich and poor.
contribute more to this topic. Let us see if we can bring a new method in measuring happiness.
Warm Regards,
Arun
Sir,
In my view happiness can never be measured in terms of of numbers or with the help of any kind of mathematical formula because we never can decipher out the amount or intensity of one's happiness because on one hand where we are not happy with a hundred pairs of clothes that we have ,a person in need would be happy with just one pair of clothes on his body.Also income of a person being one of the most contemplated factors , but still income alone can never unravel the actual utility or satisfaction or happiness. There are several other factors other than income playing different roles in enciphering a person's level of happiness these might be status, name, popularity ,fame ,dignity in society , personal needs and other factors.But in a country like India first we need to fulfill basic needs of people that is eradication of poverty and then after development we can think of increasing the Gross National Happiness.
BY SONAKSHI JAIN
what do they mean by the term "happiness"? and what all is incorporated in it?
Happiness is something for which everyone is searching for but no one could actually get it.happiness in itself is very abstract and it varies from person to person and from time to time.but the general notion is, money is something which can get us near to happiness if not actual happiness.in today's world ,i may not be wrong, in saying that money can buy happiness because since very tender age we are taught to value money as it is the source of happiness.even we are sent to school with sole idea - education will secure our job,means of earning,which in consequence will provide us with power to buy,"buy things which give us happiness".
Happiness is something for which everyone is searching for but no one could actually get it.happiness in itself is very abstract and it varies from person to person and from time to time.but the general notion is, money is something which can get us near to happiness if not actual happiness.in today's world ,i may not be wrong, in saying that money can buy happiness because since very tender age we are taught to value money as it is the source of happiness.even we are sent to school with sole idea - education will secure our job,means of earning,which in consequence will provide us with power to buy,"buy things which give us happiness".
Happiness is something for which everyone is searching for but no one could actually get it.happiness in itself is very abstract and it varies from person to person and from time to time.but the general notion is, money is something which can get us near to happiness if not actual happiness.in today's world ,i may not be wrong, in saying that money can buy happiness because since very tender age we are taught to value money as it is the source of happiness.even we are sent to school with sole idea - education will secure our job,means of earning,which in consequence will provide us with power to buy,"buy things which give us happiness".
This phenomenon can be observed largely in our society, but in my opinion higher affluence may lead to more happiness to a certain extent,but yes in those cases too affluence is not the only factor.For instance a person who has a good family life,and every other basic need of his life is satisfied, then he derives more happiness from higher affluence but after a certain point where his needs and some other luxuries are fulfilled more affluence does not promise more happiness rather in many cases hapiness may decrease because of human tendancy of demanding more and more and because of the quest to acquire what the other has, and this quest generally grows as the wealth grows.So yes there cannot be a centralized single matrix for the study of hapiness in a society but we can have different criteria for different sections of society.
Sir,
After reading this article we can see how the theory that to get everything in this life all you need is money. Money is not the only priority to get everything in life but it is one of the priority as we could see in this article that sometimes we could not purchase happiness with it and what will be exact value of happiness can't be determined by it.
Sir,In todays world happiness can be calculated by money,and happiness is something which can be calculated .On the basis of study which has showed that having an impressively high degree of social connections, career satisfaction and political and economic stability -- all of which are known to promote happiness .Also the GDP plays an important role as we can seee the the most happiest country this year was denmark because it has an high GDP and high economic growth.
FINALLY i want to say that MONEY could be a key to happiness.
I've more than once seen the mesmerizing effect money has on people.Able people have even bought merit with their money,if we talk about the recent PMT exams.A traffic policeman,if not an ideal one,will very profoundly show you the difference.If,for example you're travelling on a two wheeler and you do not follow the traffic lights,the policeman will come upon you with direct cusses and taunts,which he will think about doing if you were in a four wheeler SUV.
Well,Of course financial security is very important to happiness, but it is not the only thing.The balance between the need for financial security and other things also changes with one's circumstances.
For instance,financial security is more important to our parents than it is to us.They need to be financially secure to be able to provide us a good life in order for us to be happy.
But, on the other hand,money doesn't suffice for everything else in life.A corrupt lawyer,for example,who takes up cases to save the guilty from being prosecuted might earn a lot of money but will never achieve the true prospect of life,because all the way his conscience is asleep.His juniors and the interns under him might fear him but will never respect or be inspired by him.
I therefore believe that deference and intellect should be valued above blue-bloodedness.
HAPPINESS
It is true that sometimes money can buy happiness but not always.According to my understanding the comparision shown in the article states that if the other friend has more money then we become dejected and feel greedy that we don't but actually every time money cannot buy us happiness. Though people being poor they seemed to be more happy than the people who are rich. As rich people are busy running behind money and they have no time to enjoy their lives and small happiness that is around them. The greed in them doesn't allow them to see happiness.While the poor would try to self satisfy themselves with the things they have and enjoy small moments of life while the rich people can't as they are busy behind money. So happiness can't be always "priced".
sir, i agree that to some extend money bring happiness because people always do no bother about what they have or do not happy with what actually they have but they wanting what not have and that makes them happy and happiness come from appreciating what you have.another aspect is that well being is more affected by relative income than by absolute income
Sir, i dont think money and happiness should be co-related. As it is rightly said "money cant buy happines". Happiness comes from inside and not from money. Money is just a supporting factor . Rich people alos have many problems because they have to do a lot of work and in limited time. So i think a country should be called a happier country if there are low crime rates and there is an equal distribution of income.
- YASHASVI SINGH
Dear Yash, Sumit, Anushka, Shrishti, Praveer, Amim, Anukrati, Sonakshi & Prakharshree... Varied views and many directions on this issue.
Question: What is human life for? What should be the objective of our lives?
Looking forward to your answers..
Warm Regards,
Arun
Sir
A human life is created to acheive happiness through his hard work and the objective of the life should be to share happiness with all those people who do not get an equal and fair opportunity to work hard.
Does more money make people happier? There is a lot of debate on this question.But what is sure that no money makes happiness difficult.Moreover factors such as health that is strongly associated with happiness can sometimes related to money.On the last note:How many rich people do you know that are really happy?
This topic can be extensively debated . But if we take simple real life examples we can conclude what is there in the theory. Even if a person is earning crores a month he is not satisfied with his income. He wants more and more. And he spends much of his time in earning money. But people with average income tend to be more happier and content with what they have. They have a sort of mindset that they're not gonna earn more than say 100000 a month. They will try to find happiness in those 100000. They will spend more time in a happy state rather than thinking about money all the time. As we all know marginal utility of money never decreases. It keeps on increasing as and when you get more money. Greed for money of such people keeps on increasing.
Thank you
Shailee Joshi
Section C
Yes Amim, Vivek & Shailee, its highly debatable.
When you read Gandhi, you will agree
When you read Bill gates, Steve Jobs or Ambani - Sky is not the limit for wealth seeking and riches.
In the short run there is a vision of infinity (Inequality in everything)
In the long run, everyone dies (the greatest sense of Equality)
Hope I have related some points
Warm Regards,
Arun
Really thrilled by all the comments!
It shows how far you are sensitive and full of ideas.
Keep up the good Work
Question: When you look at all modern conflicts, nationally and internationally, the fight is actually for all those things that money cannot buy. What have we lost after industrial revolution, liberalization and globalization?
sir, in your 2nd response to this article you posted a question,what is human life for?.accding to me
in this era of existence we all have somewhere forgotten, that when we are running behind certain materialistic objectives,it's for our happiness,for the happiness of our loved ones.accding to me "The purpose of life is the expansion of happiness."A futile search for an elusive meaning prevents us from correctly aligning ourselves with Objective Reality. It will frustrate our ability to achieve the only real success in life: Optimal, lasting happiness.,smile differentiates humans from the rest of the creatures on earth, as u said during d orientation,and i guess we are losing the very essence of smiling from bottom of our hearts day by day.
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