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on Economics of Happiness |
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Issue of 2008‒03‒01
five papers chosen by |
| By: | Lelkes, Orsolya |
| Abstract: | Existing evidence suggests a U-shaped relationship between age and life satisfaction, when controlling for income and education and other personal characteristics. On the other hand, there is no clear pattern between old age and happiness without the use of controls. Thus, it is not ageing as such, which results declining happiness, but rather the circumstances which are associated with ageing. Which of these circumstances could be averted? Are the preferences of the elderly are similar to others? The paper aims to explore these issues, using the European Social Survey. The results imply that the varying level of life satisfaction during the life cycle may be explained partly by changing preferences (by the decreasing importance of work, the increasing importance of religion, and the declining disutility of being single), and partly by changing circumstances. While changing preferences seem to increase well-being, changing circumstances seem to decrease it. Exceptions are the few positive changes in circumstances, which are likely to contribute to higher well-being, include increasing religiosity and relatively low pensioners’ poverty across the 21 European countries examined here. Old days thus are happy above all due to changing priorities in life. |
| Keywords: | Life Satisfaction; Age; Preferences |
| JEL: | J14 I31 Z10 |
| Date: | 2008–02–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:7302&r=hap |
| By: | Hasan, Lubna |
| Abstract: | Around the world, national governments as well as international organization measure and monitor performance of large cities and the Quality of Life (QoL) of urban residents, to gain insights into the well-being of the citizens and the state of various amenities at city level and make informed policy decisions. There is a need to develop a system of measuring and monitoring QoL and city performance in the large urban areas of Pakistan. The paper suggests a framework for measuring quality of life in Pakistani cities |
| Keywords: | Quality of Life; Pakistan; Cities |
| JEL: | R10 O18 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:6522&r=hap |
| By: | Cömertler, Necmiye; Kar, Muhsin |
| Abstract: | There is an important support to the view in public that crime rate has been increasing in the recent years in Turkey. In addition, it is argued that social and economic factors play an important role in increasing the crime in the country. The aim of this article is to determine to what extent the economic and social factors are important in this process for 81 provinces. According to the cross section analysis based on 2000 data in the province level, it is observed that income, unemployment, migration, education, demographic factors such as population density and birth rate and urbanization ratio are the main and important determinants of crime rate. |
| Keywords: | Crime rate; per capita income; unemployment; migration; urbanization; schooling rate; cross-section analysis; Turkey |
| JEL: | A13 H75 Z13 C21 |
| Date: | 2007 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:7288&r=hap |
| By: | Akiko Maruyama (Postgraduate, Kwansei Gakuin University) |
| Abstract: | This paper is an examination of the influence of an individual’s self-confidence (over- confidence or underconfidence) on others in the marriage market. We consider a model in which there are three types of men and women according to marital charm, and some men/women overestimate/underestimate their own types. The result obtained is that the self-confidence of some single individuals affects not only themselves but also the marital behavior of other rational singles in the market. Furthermore, self-confidence improves the welfare of the economy if there are enough underconfident men/women or if there are sufficiently few overconfident men/women in the marriage market. |
| Keywords: | marriage, search, overconfidence, underconfidence |
| JEL: | D82 D83 J12 |
| Date: | 2008–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kgu:wpaper:36&r=hap |
| By: | Julia Abelson (Centre for Health Economics and Policy Analysis, Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, McMaster University); François-Pierre Gauvin (Centre for Health Economics and Policy Analysis, McMaster University) |
| Abstract: | The expansion of ordinary citizens’ roles in a variety of policy and decision-making processes has created a pressing need to draw out the lessons from accumulated work in the field of public engagement to inform the design and evaluation of new public engagement processes. In particular, the effects of these roles on decision processes and outcomes, and on the citizens themselves, warrant scrutiny. These questions are increasingly relevant to health policy makers and health system managers working in local, provincial and national or pan-Canadian settings to find meaningful and effective ways to involve citizens in their decision-making processes. In this paper, we explore what is known about the extent to which the goals of public participation in policy have been met. The current state of knowledge about the impact of public participation on policy and civic literacy is reviewed along with the conceptual and methodological approaches to evaluation and their associated challenges. The published (English and French) empirical public participation evaluation literature is also reviewed and reflections from key informant interviews with policy makers and public participation practitioners are shared. The limits to evaluation and its uptake are discussed and strategies for advancing the practice and methods of public participation evaluation are outlined. |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hpa:wpaper:0801&r=hap |