Are Happier People Better Citizens?

This paper presents evidence on causal influence of happiness on social capital and trust using German Socio-Economic Panel. Exploiting the unexplained cross-sectional variation in individual happiness (residuals) in 1984 to eliminate the endogeneity problem, the paper nds that happier people trust others more, and importantly, help create more social capital. Specifically, they have a higher desire to vote, perform more volunteer work, and more frequently participate in public activities. They also have a higher respect for law and order, hold more association memberships, are more attached to their neighborhood, and extend more help to others. Residual happiness appears to be an indicator of optimism, and has an inverse U-shaped relationship with social capital measures. The findings also suggest that the relationship between happiness and social capital strengthened in the world in the last decade.happiness, trust, social capital, optimism.

Reversing the Question: Does Happiness Affect Consumption and Savings Behavior?

I examine the impact of happiness on consumption and savings behavior using data from the DNB Household Survey from the Netherlands and the German Socio-Economic Panel. Instrumenting individual happiness with regional sunshine, the results suggest that happier people save more, spend less, and have a lower marginal propensity to consume. Happier people take more time for making decisions and have more control over expenditures; they expect a longer life and (accordingly) seem more concerned about the future than the present; they also expect less inflation in the future.happiness, savings, consumption, weather

Why Is The World Getting Older? The Influence of Happiness on Mortality

World life expectancy has risen by around 20 years in the last 50 years. This period has also witnessed rising happiness levels around the world suggesting that happiness might be one of the causes behind the decline in mortality. We investigate the relationship between happiness and mortality using the German Socio-Economic Panel. We consider doctor visits, self-reported health, and presence of chronic illness as health measures. After controlling for initial health conditions, we find that happiness extends life expectancy. 10 percent increase in happiness decreases probability of death by four percent, and this effect is more pronounced for men and younger people. Happiness plays a more important role for chronically ill people in decreasing mortality than for those who are not chronically ill. The positive influence of happiness on mortality can offset the negative impact of chronic illness. Marriage decreases mortality and this effect appears to work through increased happiness.happiness; mortality; health; chronic illness.

Marital Status is Misunderstood in Happiness Models

One of the most common findings in contemporary empirical social science is that being married is associated with higher measured levels of happiness, or life satisfaction. The result seems to be consistent across both countries and time, and is apparently robust to statistical method, including with respect to econometric specification and fixed effects modelling. Our contribution is to propose that quality of a marriage is likely to be a very important factor in our understanding of the role of marital status, and to conjecture that for some married people being in an alternative state would be conducive to a higher level of happiness. We test this simple idea with conventional OLS modelling using life satisfaction data from three countries, the US, the UK and Germany, and the findings are very clear. We find that the coefficient on the marriage dummy is significant and important with the usual modelling but once marriage quality is controlled for, the effects of being married are extremely different between those in good compared to those in poor marriages. In all three data sets people in self-assessed poor marriages are fairly miserable, and much less happy than unmarried people, and people in self-assessed good marriages are even more happy than the literature reports. We also find that the results differ importantly between women and men, with members of the former sex showing a greater range of responses to marriage quality than do men. A final set of results is that, when marriage quality is controlled for, the apparent marriage effects on other outcome variables, such as self reported health and trust, change significantly.marriage, happiness, health, marriage quality

Why Is the World Getting Older?: The Influence of Happiness on Mortality

World life expectancy has risen by around 20 years in the last 50 years. This period has also witnessed rising happiness levels around the world suggesting that happiness might be one of the causes behind the decline in mortality. We investigate the relationship between happiness and mortality using the German Socio-Economic Panel. We consider doctor visits, self-reported health, and presence of chronic illness as health measures. After controlling for initial health conditions, we find that happiness extends life expectancy. 10 percent increase in happiness decreases probability of death by four percent, and this effect is more pronounced for men and younger people. Happiness plays a more important role for chronically ill people in decreasing mortality than for those who are not chronically ill. The positive influence of happiness on mortality can offset the negative impact of chronic illness. Marriage decreases mortality and this effect appears to work through increased happiness.Happiness, mortality, health, chronic illness

Height and Cognitive Function among Older Europeans: Do People from "Tall" Countries Have Superior Cognitive Abilities?

Previous research has found that height is correlated with cognitive functioning at older ages. It therefore makes sense to ask a related question: do people from countries where the average person is relatively tall have superior cognitive abilities on average? Using data from the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe (SHARE), we find empirical evidence that this is the case, even after controlling for self-reported childhood health, self-reported childhood abilities, parental characteristics and education. We find that people from countries with relatively tall people, such as Denmark and the Netherlands, have on average superior cognitive abilities compared to people from countries with relatively shorter people, such as Italy and Spain. We exploit variations in height trends due to nutritional deprivation in World War II in Europe and use an instrumental variable analysis to further estimate the potential impact of height on cognitive function. We find some suggestive evidence that a causal link from height to cognitive outcomes could be operating via nutrition and not via educational attainment.height, cognitive function, instrumental variables, World War II

Reversing the Question. Does Happiness Affect Consumption and Savings Behavior?

Better understanding of the relationship between happiness and economic behavior may help design economic policies such as tax and retirement policies, and regulate the timing of macroeconomic announcements. I examine the impact of happiness on consumption and savings behavior. I use data from the DNB Household Survey from the Netherlands and the German Socio-Economic Panel. Instrumenting individual happiness with regional sunshine, the results suggest that happier people save more, spend less, and have a lower marginal propensity to consume. Happier people take more time for making decisions and have more control over expenditures; they expect a longer life and (accordingly) seem more concerned about the future than the present; they also expect less in ation in the future. The results of the paper might also help understand the observed low coefficient on income in any happiness equation that does not instrument income.happiness, savings, consumption, climate

Weather and Financial Risk-Taking: Is Happiness the Channel?

Weather variables, in particular sunshine, are found to be strongly correlated with financial variables. I consider self-reported happiness as a channel through which sunshine affects financial variables. I examine the influence of happiness on risk-taking behavior by instrumenting individual happiness with regional sunshine. I find that happy people appear to be more risk-averse in financial decisions and (accordingly) choose safer investments. Happy people take more time for making decisions and have more self-control. Happy people also expect a longer life and (accordingly) seem more concerned about the future than the present and expect less inflation.happiness, risk-taking, behavioral finance, weather.

Weather and Financial Risk-Taking: Is Happiness the Channel?

Weather variables, and sunshine in particular, are found to be strongly correlated with financial variables. I consider self-reported happiness as a channel through which sunshine affects financial variables. I examine the influence of happiness on risk-taking behavior by instrumenting individual happiness with regional sunshine, and I find that happy people appear to be more risk-averse in financial decisions, and accordingly choose safer investments. Happy people take more time for making decisions and have more self-control. Happy people also expect to live longer and accordingly seem more concerned about the future than the present, and expect less inflation.happiness, risk-taking, climate

Are Happier People Better Citizens?

This paper presents evidence on causal influence of happiness on social capital and trust using German Socio-Economic Panel. Exploiting the unexplained cross-sectional variation in individual happiness (residuals) in 1984 to eliminate the endogeneity problem, the paper finds that happier people trust others more, and importantly, help create more social capital. Specifically, they have a higher desire to vote, perform more volunteer work, and more frequently participate in public activities. They also have a higher respect for law and order, hold more association memberships, are more attached to their neighborhood, and extend more help to others. Residual happiness appears to be an indicator of optimism, and has an inverse U-shaped relationship with social capital measures. The findings also suggest that the relationship between happiness and social capital strengthened in the world in the last decade.happiness, trust, social capital, optimism