Tuesday, February 01, 2011

Does money make you happy? Absolutely

http://lifeinc.todayshow.com/_news/2011/02/01/5961656-does-money-make-you-happy-absolutely-

saw about money and happiness. Apparently, money can purchase a whole lot of happiness.

After poring over data from 140 countries, researchers from The Wharton School concluded that the more money you have, the more satisfied you are with life – and that relationship holds true whether you are a citizen of the United States or of Burundi. As it turns out, the happiness effect isn’t relative; it’s based on a person’s absolute income.

What that means is that your happiness is very dependent on the economic prosperity of the country in which you live. As a general rule, the wealthier a nation is, the happier its citizens are.

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Wolfers and his colleagues also looked at changes in happiness over time. They found that, as a general rule, citizens of countries that were experiencing economic growth tended to become happier with time. But not in the United States.

Wolfers explains: “That may be because all the income growth went to the very rich. So only a small number of people got richer.”

This might be a good reason for nations to make sure they share the wealth. Perhaps if the standard of living in Egypt and Tunisia were higher, things would be quieter there.

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