Inequality of Subjective Well-Being as a Comprehensive Measure of Inequality

Abstract

The link between happiness and overall inequality is best studied using an index that incorporates different aspects of inequality, and is measured consistently in different countries. One such index is the degree to which happiness itself varies among individuals. Its correlation with both happiness levels and social trust is substantially stronger than the corresponding correlation for income inequality. This remains so after allowing for bounded scale reporting, including a purely ordinal measure of dispersion. Moreover, the correlation is stronger for individuals who profess to care most about inequality. The link between happiness and inequality may thus be stronger than previously appreciated.

Economy, Culture and Happiness: Is There Interconnection?

“…The first is from the World Bank, the same source used by Goff et al (2016), and it shows for us, as it generally did for them, no significant negative effect, whether or not the inequality of well-being is also included in the equation. The second measure, as described in the Statistical Appendix, is based on Gini coefficients constructed from the incomes reported by individual respondents to the Gallup World Poll.…”

“…62 The negative effect of well-being inequality becomes significant only when regional dummy variables are also included, as also found by Goff et al (2016). That paper includes income and regional dummy variables for all regions, but none of the other variables used in Table 2.1.…”

“…65 We use the standard deviation as our preferred measure of well-being inequality, following Kalmijn & Veenhoven (2005) and Goff et al (2016). See also Delhey &Kohler (2011) andVeenhoven (2012).…”

Gi oss politikken tilbake i helsepolitikken!

“…What the evidence in Goff et al (2016) shows is that the combined effect of the two-way linkage between social trust and inequality is larger for well-being inequality than for income inequality.…”

Discrimination and disability: Types of discrimination and association with trust, self‐efficacy and life satisfaction among older Australians

“…moving more than half-way down the income distribution'[28; p. 14] Goff, Helliwell, and Mayraz (2018),. further confirmed this finding based on analyses of large-scale international surveys (the European Social Survey, the World Values Survey, the Gallup World Poll, and the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index (survey waves 1995-2015))[35].LimitationsInterpretation of our findings needs to be balanced by the limitations of the data and analysis. Oneimportant limitation of this study is the measurement of disability.…”