I take the terms happiness, utility, well-being, life satisfaction, and welfare to be interchangeable… Richard Ainley Easterlin, 2003
So what makes us happy? Here are a few of the feeder streams:
· Agency: you're pretty confident you can do what's needed to get achieve important goals
· Sense of control: you can actually change a situation
· Predictability: you can anticipate future events, a precondition of pursuing goals
· Sense of purpose: there are things you want to achieve
· Sense of progress: you are moving forward and getting closer to your goals
· Social inclusion: other people care about you
· Social intimacy: somebody really cares about you and the feeling’s mutual
· Family: there are people with whom you feel deeply connected
· Social reciprocity: you are part of a web of deep caring and commitment
· Social status: some people look up to you
· Positive social comparison: at least you’re doing better than…
· Health: you feel well enough to enjoy life
· Safety: you don’t have to look around your shoulder all the time
· Security: you can relax – eternal vigilance not required
· Challenge: the reward is often in the overcoming
As for the relationship between inequality and happiness, it’s complicated. Inequality alone - that is, controlling for poverty and social mobility - does not appear to have a strong, consistent or direct effect on society-wide levels of happiness. And in the US and elsewhere, surveys have consistently found that inequality simply isn’t a pressing issue for most people. Still, the very thought of inequality does makes some people very angry and indignant. But those reactions are often based on ideas, e.g. social justice or a zero-sum understanding of economics.
I’m more interested in the effect of inequality on the feeder streams of happiness. For instance, high inequality may increase awareness of the super-rich, which triggers the social comparison blues in some people. For others, though, it may present an exciting challenge. Then, again, comparison with any better-off person or group could trigger the blues, the excitement of challenge, or just vicarious enjoyment. The effect of such comparison is a matter of personality and societal conditions. When living conditions and social mobility are good enough, high levels of inequality may very well increase happiness in the general population through its effect on motivation, e.g., successful people may be seen more as models of what’s possible than as obstacles to achievement. (Determining what constitutes “good enough” living conditions and social mobility is a matter for another post.)
A lingering question is whether, and under what conditions, high inequality increases poverty or stymies social mobility, both of which have a clear and direct effect on happiness. If high levels of inequality exacerbate poverty or create systemic barriers to social mobility in a particular country, then one could say inequality creates conditions that undermine happiness in that country. But even if that were the case, getting rid of “excessive” inequality may not make the people happier, at least not if high inequality also creates conditions conducive to happiness, such as a vibrant economy. As I said earlier: it’s complicated.
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References:
Argyleand, M. & Martin, M. (1991) The psychological causes of happiness. Chapter 5 in Subjective well-being: an interdisciplinary perspective Fritz Strack, Michael Argyle, Norbert Schwarz (Eds.) Oxford: Pergamon Press, 77-100.
Campbell C. Distinguishing the Power of Agency from Agentic Power: A Note on Weber and the “Black Box” of Personal Agency. Sociological Theory. 2009;27(4):407-418. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9558.2009.01355.x
Diener, E. & Suh, E. (1997). Measuring quality of life: Economic, social, and subjective indicators. Social Indicators Research, 40, 189–216.
Easterlin, R. A. (2003). "Explaining happiness." Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 100(19): 11176-11183.
Yeon-Ok Lim, The Effects of Interpersonal and Personal Agency on Perceived Control and Psychological Well-Being in Adulthood, The Gerontologist, Volume 40, Issue 4, 1 August 2000, Pages 458–468, https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/40.4.458
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