The Origins of Happiness: The Science of Well-Being Over the Life Course

339 Pages·2019·6.96 MB·English

by  Andrew E Clark, Sarah Fleche, Richard Layard, Nattavudh Powdthavee, George Ward

THE
ORIGINS
OF
HAPPINESS

The
Origins
Of
happiness
The Science of Well-B eing
over the Life Course
Andrew E. Clark, Sarah Flèche,
Richard Layard, Nattavudh Powdthavee,
and George Ward
With a new preface by the authors
Princeton University Press Princeton & Oxford
125-80251_Clark_OriginsofHappiness_ch01_2P.indd 3 5/11/19 7:46 AM
Copyright © 2018 by Princeton University Press
Preface to the paperback edition, copyright © 2019
by Princeton University Press
Published by Princeton University Press,
41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540
In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press,
6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TR
press.princeton.edu
Cover image courtesy LZT / Alamy Stock Vector
All Rights Reserved
First paperback edition, 2019
Paperback ISBN 978-0-691-19633-6
Cloth ISBN 978- 0- 691- 17789- 2
British Library Cataloging- in- Publication Data is available
This book has been composed in Sabon and Scala Sans
Printed on acid- free paper. ∞
Printed in the United States of America
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To Gus o’D onnell
champion of well- beinG

CONTENTS
Preface to the Paperback Edition ix
Introduction: The New Paradigm 1
1. Happiness over the Life Course:
What Matters Most? 15
parT i. whaT makes a happy aDulT?
2. Income 33
3. Education 51
4. Work and Unemployment 61
5. Building a Family 77
6. Health of Mind and Body 89
7. Crime 105
8. Social Norms and Institutions 115
9. Happiness at Older Ages 129
parT ii. whaT makes a successful chilD?
10. Family Income 153
11. Working Parents 161
12. Parenting and Parents’ Mental Health 169
13. Family Conflict 179
14. Schooling 187
vii
Contents
parT iii. so whaT?
15. Measuring Cost- Effectiveness in Terms of
Happiness 197
16. The Origins of Happiness 211
Our Thanks 235
Contents of Online Materials 237
Sources and Notes for Tables and Figures 239
Notes 257
References 281
Index 301
Cartoon Credits 325
viii
prefaCe TO The
paperbaCk ediTiOn
Since we wrote this book, the need for it has become steadily
more apparent. More and more policy makers now believe
that the aim of policy should be to improve the well-being
of the people. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation
and Development, which first published the internationally
comparable measures of GDP, advocates in its June 2016
meeting report, Strategic Orientations of the Secretary-General:
For 2016 and Beyond (https://www.oecd.org/mcm/documents
/strategic-orientations-of-the-secretary-general-2016.pdf), that
we should “put people’s well-being at the centre of govern-
ments’ efforts.” And in October 2019, the OECD will hold a
major conference of governments interested in making sub-
jective well-being an operational target of their policies.
Meantime, New Zealand has already become the first
industrial country to make well-being its objective and to
launch a well-being budget. Other countries are moving in
that direction. In France and Sweden, budget measures are
now analyzed to show their effects on subjective well-being.
And in Britain, the new version of the Treasury’s manual
for policy evaluation has been rewritten to make “social
well-being” the objective of public policy and to encourage
the use of direct measures of well-being along with the tra-
ditional measures based on willingness-to-pay.
All of this is part of a new worldwide movement of opinion.
For some years, the United Nations has hosted the annual
ix
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