Can I Sustain My Happiness? A Review, Critique and Research Agenda for Economics of Happiness

Abstract

Human beings want to live in a state of happiness and prosperity, but happiness is important not just for the well-being of individuals but for the well-being of society. To ensure the maximization of happiness, it is necessary to consider more than just money, and rather include the right understanding of happiness at the individual level, the family level, the society level, and the environmental (nature) level. This paper contributes to the existing body of knowledge by consolidating the findings of the literature; grouping those into major themes and sub-themes; describing the mechanisms based on the empirical papers by highlighting the independent, dependent, control, and moderating variables, to study the causal relationships between variables under study; proposing an agenda for future research; and informing the policymakers about decisions influencing the human happiness level through legislative rules and regulations. Our results suggest prioritizing the conceptualization of happiness while computing the happiness level at the individual or collective levels. Furthermore, the study recommends governments to establish the conditions enabling individuals to report happiness independently from the political pressure to answer strategically for impressive happiness level figures at the macro level.

Reviving tourism industry post-COVID-19: A resilience-based framework

“…This methodology is driven by its merits in the form of systematic, transparent, and replicable review ( Cook, Greengold, Ellrodt, & Weingarten, 1997 ; Cook, Mulrow, & Haynes, 1997 ; Hao & al, 2019 ; Wolf, Shea, & Albanese, 2001 ). It is also inspired by prior review articles ( Bansal, Garg, & Sharma, 2019 ; Dhaliwal, Singh, & Paul, 2020 ; Gilal, Zhang, Paul, & Gilal, 2019 ; Jain, Sharma, & Mahendru, 2019 ; Paul & Feliciano-Cestero, 2020 ; Paul & Mas, 2020 ; Rosado-Serrano, Paul, & Dikova, 2018 ; Talan & Sharma, 2019 ; Thomas & Paul, 2019 ).…”

From Challenges to Creativity: Enhancing SMEs’ Resilience in the Context of COVID-19

“…The first group focussed on understanding the (economic) impact of the COVID-19 on small firms [30] and how SME managers had prepared themselves to cope with the crisis over an extended period [13] as a result of restriction from the Movement Control Order (MCO) [14,31]. The different types of strategies included a formal crisis management plan, strategies to survive and thrive after the outbreak, and differentiation of some of these strategies based on firm size were discussed [13]. The factors that can enhance the survival of SMEs during and post-COVID were also part of this first group [5,6,16,32].…”

“…The paper is structured as follows. Immediately after the literature review (see next section), a rapid but systematic methodology in Section 3 as advised by [10][11][12][13] is undertaken to ascertain how SMEs' ability to deal with the financial constraints during COVID-19 has been addressed in 67 articles. We screen these publications to zero in 34 articles related to our theme and review those as part of this study.…”

Current Developments on the Economics of Happiness: Evidence from Turkey

“…These are the existence of positive emotions or high levels of positive effects, absence of negative emotions or low levels of negative effects, and life satisfaction. The presence of positive effects and absence of negative effects realize the affect balance and are affected by daily events while life satisfaction express to long-term valuation of one's own life (Jain et al 2019).…”

“…In Western culture, individuals try to find happiness through an independent institution. However, in East Asia, culture defines happiness as a balance between self and others (Jain et al 2019). However, since states and institutions determine happiness and satisfaction indicators according to certain scales and pay more attention, the report on this issue is accepted globally.…”