2013-05-05 papers

on Economics of Happiness

Issue of 2013‒05‒05
two papers chosen by

Smoking Bans, Cigarette Prices and Life Satisfaction By Reto Odermatt; Alois Stutzer
Sociability, Altruism and Subjective Well-Being By Leonardo Becchetti; Luisa Corrado; Pierluigi Conzo

Smoking Bans, Cigarette Prices and Life Satisfaction

By:	Reto Odermatt; Alois Stutzer (University of Basel)
Abstract:	<p style="margin-bottom:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; line-height: normal; text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"">The consequences of tobacco control policies for individual welfare are difficult to assess. We therefore evaluate the impact of smoking bans and cigarette prices on subjective well-being by analyzing data for 40 European countries and regions between 1990 and 2011. We exploit the staggered introduction of bans and apply an imputation strategy to study the effect of anti-smoking policies on people with different propensities to smoke. We find that higher cigarette prices reduce the life satisfaction of likely smokers. Overall, smoking bans are not related to subjective well-being, but increase the life satisfaction of smokers who recently failed to quit smoking. The latter finding is consistent with cue-triggered models of addiction and the idea of bans as self-control devices.</span>
Keywords:	Smoking bans, cigarette prices, life satisfaction, addiction, self-control, tobacco, control policies
JEL:	D03 D62 I18 K32
Date:	2013
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bsl:wpaper:2013/07&r=hap

Sociability, Altruism and Subjective Well-Being

By:	Leonardo Becchetti (University of Rome "Tor Vergata"); Luisa Corrado (University of Rome "Tor Vergata"); Pierluigi Conzo (Dept. of Economics and Statistics "Cognetti de Martiis", University of Turin)
Abstract:	We provide non experimental evidence of the relevance of sociability on subjective wellbeing by investigating the determinants of life satisfaction on a large sample of Europeans aged above 50. We document that voluntary work, religious attendance, helping friends/neighbours and participation to community-related organizations affect positively and significantly life satisfaction. We illustrate the different impact that some sociability variables have on eudaimonic versus cognitive measures of subjective wellbeing. Our empirical findings discriminate among other regarding and self-regarding preferences as rationales explaining such behaviour. We document that different combinations between actions and motivations have different impact on life satisfaction thereby providing support for the relevance of these specific "contingent goods" and to the literature of procedural utility. Our findings are confirmed in robustness checks including refinements of the dependent variable, instrumental variables and sensitivity analysis on departures from the exogeneity assumption.
Keywords:	Tsunami, sociability, altruism, other-regarding activities, other regarding motivations, life satisfaction, subjective well-being
JEL:	A13 D13 D64
Date:	2013–04
URL:	http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ent:wpaper:wp49&r=hap

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