Subjective and Objective Well-Being in Relation to Economic Inputs: Puzzles and Responses

Abstract

Systematic, large discrepancies exist between direct measures of well-being and the measures that economists largely concentrate on, notably income. The paper assesses and rejects claims that income is satisfactorily correlated with well-being, and addresses the implications of discrepancies between income measures and measures of subjective well-being (SWB) and objective well-being (OWB) and also between subjective and objective well-being measures themselves. It discusses a range of possible responses to the discrepancies: for example, examination of the specifications used for income, SWB and OWB, and looking for other causal factors and at their possible competitive relations with economic inputs to well-being. It rejects responses that ignore the discrepancies or drastically downgrade their significance by adopting a well-being conception that ignores both SWB and OWB arguments (e.g.: by a claim that all that matters is choice or being active). It concludes that the projects of Sen and others to build syntheses of the relevant responses require further attention.subjective well-being, objective well-being, well-being, Easterlin paradox, capability approach,

The Local Conception of Wellbeing in Lao Social Cultural Construction

“…His disputes with Martha Nussbaum, who is guarded of the term precisely since its utilitarian baggage, and the imaginative and brighten work of many of their discussants, have improved the recent development literature (Nussbaum & Sen, 1993;Alkire, 2002;Gasper, 2004). There are also other remarkable presents of the concept to be more comprehensible including Partha Dasgupta's "Inquiry into Human Wellbeing and Destitution" (Dasgupta, 1993); and some of the writing of Robert Chambers on the notion of "responsible wellbeing" (Chambers, 2004).…”

Social Sustainability in an Ageing Chinese Society: Towards an Integrative Conceptual Framework

“…It is mainly conceptualized on the basis of one's cognitive and emotional evaluation of life (e.g., life satisfaction) and feeling (e.g., happiness) [41][42][43], which are linked to a wide range of sub-components. These sub-components vary widely, from subjective concepts (e.g., life and needs satisfaction) to objective conditions (e.g., health and security), from social (e.g., social relationships) to physical aspects (e.g., a healthy environment), and from goals (e.g., happiness and success) to instrumental behaviors and means (e.g., entertainment and socio-economic resources) [39,44,45].…”

Hierarchical Needs, Income Comparisons, and Happiness Levels

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“…Furthermore, it has been maintained that the relation between objective (income) and subjective well-being involves complicated methodological assumptions and requires interdisciplinary work in order to be understood properly (see Gasper, 2005). …”