Emotional Prosperity and the Stiglitz Commission

Abstract

This paper argues --in line with the proposals of the recent Stiglitz Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress --that we should now be measuring a nation"s emotional prosperity rather than its economic prosperity (that is, we ought to focus on the level of mental well-being not the number of pounds in people"s bank accounts). The paper reviews recent ideas in this field. It also describes seven recent studies that, worryingly, suggest that emotional prosperity may be declining through time. For labourmarket specialists, a key question for future research is how much this downward trend can be traced back to increased pressures in working life. That question currently remains open.

Rethinking the shadow economy in terms of happiness. Evidence for the European Union Member States

“…Moreover, our findings come to stress the idea of Stiglitz et al (2010) and Oswald (2010) about the importance of measuring a nation's emotional prosperity rather than its economic prosperity, focusing on well-being than wealth. The attempt to use a Gross National Happiness measuring the overall social well-being as an alternative for Gross Domestic Product measuring only the economic well-being is more than never required by current research and police-makers should know this.…”

“…Stiglitz et al (2010) highlights the importance of measuring a nation's emotional prosperity rather than its economic prosperity, focusing on well-being than wealth. Oswald (2010), a pioneer of happiness economics and a member of the Stiglitz Comission, reveals that the research area in the economics field could consist in emotional prosperity. Therefore, many behavioral acts in the economics field are better explained.…”

The Negative Association of Obesity with Subjective Well-Being: Is it All About Health?

“…5 This is the type of survey information that is very widely used in both psychology and economics to capture SWB (e.g. Oswald 2010). …”

“…The control variables include age and its square, three education groups and annual earnings that constitute the standard control variables which have been used in the literature on SWB (e.g. Oswald 2010). The estimation results of Eq.…”

“…This research has documented several stylized facts that relate SWB to individual characteristics such as age and labour market status, among other things (e.g. Oswald 2010). However, only a few empirical studies have explored the effect of obesity on SWB in economics (Oswald and Powdthavee 2007;Stutzer 2007;Clark and Etilé 2009;Katsaiti 2012;Foster and Moore 2012).…”