Happiness, self-rated health, and income inequality: Evidence from nationwide surveys in Japan

We examine how regional inequality affects happiness and self-rated health at an individual level by using micro data from nationwide surveys in Japan. Individuals who live in the area of high inequality tend to report themselves as both unhappy and unhealthy, even after controlling for various individual and regional characteristics and taking into account the correlation between the two subjective outcomes. We also investigate how their sensitivities to regional inequality change by key individual attributes. People with an unstable work status are most affected by inequality when assessing both happiness and health.happiness, self-rated health, income inequality

The effect of smoking on individual well-being: a propensity score matching analysis based on nationwide surveys in Japan

Background: It is widely known that smokers tend to feel less satisfied than non-smokers with their jobs and life more generally. However, it is not easy to establish a causal relationship between smoking and individual well-being, because of shared associations with socioeconomic or demographic factors. This issue was largely avoided in the present study, which used propensity score matching methods to investigate whether smoking affects the extent to which individuals are satisfied with their job and other aspects of their life. Methods: Using a large-scale Japanese dataset, we first estimated propensity scores for smoking as a function of numerous socioeconomic and demographic factors. We then matched smokers to non-smokers on the basis of these. We subsequently estimated the average treatment effect, considering smoking as a treatment and smokers as the treated group. We used different matching methods to ascertain the robustness of any effects. Results: We found that smoking made both males and females unhappy, and that it reduced both the extent to which they were satisfied with multiple aspects of their lives (including their job, non-working activities, household's financial conditions, family life, friendships, residential area, health and physical conditions) and their level of self-rated health. Some of these effects differed between males and females. Conclusions: Our propensity score matching analyses identified smoking as having direct adverse effects on individual well-being.Smoking, Happiness, Job satisfaction, Self-rated Health, Propensity score matching

Regional income inequality and happiness: Evidence from Japan

We investigated how regional income inequality is associated with the individual assessment of happiness based on micro data from nationwide surveys in Japan. Our multilevel analysis using logit and ordered logit models confirmed that individuals who live in areas of high inequality tend to report themselves as less happy, even after controlling for various individual and regional factors. Notably, the fact that happiness depends on not only income but also income inequality indicates the importance of income redistribution for individual well-being. We also find that the association between regional inequality and happiness is not uniform across the different levels of perceived happiness. Moreover, the sensitivities of happiness to regional inequality differ substantially by key individual attributes such as gender, marital status, level of education, occupational status, and political views. Among others, an important finding for social policy is that those of unstable occupational status and those with a lower level of education are more sensitive to regional inequality. Given the fact that these people tend to be less happy than the others, this result points to the risk that regional inequality additionally reduces the well-being of those under unfavorable socioeconomic conditions.Happiness, income inequality, multilevel analysis, Japan

Child poverty as a determinant of life outcomes:Evidence from nationwide surveys in Japan

We attempt to examine the extent to which poverty in childhood adversely affects success in adulthood, using micro data from nationwide surveys in Japan and taking into account the recursive structure of life outcomes. We use retrospective assessments of income class at the age of 15, because longitudinal data on household income are not available. After controlling for its endogeneity, we confirm that children from poor families tend to have lower educational attainment, face higher poverty risks, and assess themselves as being less happy and as suffering from poorer health.Child poverty; Educational attainment; Poverty risk; Happiness; Self-rated health

Division of Household Labor and Marital Satisfaction in China, Japan, and Korea

In this study, we compare the association of marital satisfaction with the division of labor between husband and wife in Asia, based on Chinese, Japanese, and Korean General Social Surveys in 2006 (N = 2,346, 997, and 990, respectively). Results show that in all three countries, wives are less satisfied than husbands with marriage, mainly because wives do disproportionately more housework than husbands. Aside from this common gender difference, there are noticeable differences among the three countries. Chinese couples are relatively in favor of an egalitarian division of labor in terms of both market work and housework. Japanese couples are supportive of traditional specialization, with the wives flexibly shifting their efforts between market work and housework. Korean couples are under pressure from conflicts between the wife‘s labor force participation and the traditional division of labor in the household.Division of household labor, gender difference, marital satisfaction

Relative income and happiness in Asia: Evidence from nationwide surveys in China, Japan, and Korea

This study attempts to examine relative income effects on perceived happiness in three major Asian countries -- China, Japan, and Korea -- in comparison with the United Sates, on the basis of largely comparable nationwide surveys in these countries. Consistent with the results from previous studies in Western countries, comparisons with an individual's own income and average income of the reference group are significantly associated with the individual's perceived happiness in Asia. The associations between relative income and happiness are stronger for individual income than family income in China, while the opposite is true in Japan and Korea. Even after controlling for the subjective assessment of family income or personal class identification within the society as a whole, income comparisons within the reference group matter for assessing happiness, especially when using family income for comparisons. Moreover, relative deprivation within the reference group, which is measured by the Yitzhaki index, is negatively related to happiness, providing more evidence for the validity of the relative income hypothesis.Relative income, Relative deprivation, Asia

Child poverty as a determinant of life outcomes: Evidence from nationwide surveys in Japan

We attempt to examine the extent to which poverty in childhood adversely affects success in adulthood, using micro data from nationwide surveys in Japan and taking into account the recursive structure of life outcomes. We use retrospective assessments of income class at the age of 15, because longitudinal data on household income are not available. After controlling for its endogeneity, we confirm that children from poor families tend to have lower educational attainment, face higher poverty risks, and assess themselves as being less happy and as suffering from poorer health.Child poverty, Educational attainment, Poverty risk, Happiness, Self-rated health

Breastfeeding Practices and Parental Employment in Japan

Much research shows that breastfeeding provides short- and long-term health benefits for both mothers and their children. However, few studies have yet investigated the factors which may promote or inhibit breastfeeding practices in Japan. To fill this research gap, this paper uses data newly gathered in 2012 on breastfeeding initiation and duration for each child of each mother, which enable us to estimate mother fixed-effects models that control for unobserved differences among mothers. Compared to mothers who leave their jobs after childbirth, mothers who return to work within a year after childbirth do not significantly differ in breastfeeding initiation but have a breastfeeding duration which is shorter by 1.654 months. On the other hand, when fathers work under a flextime system after childbirth, breastfeeding initiation is higher, and the duration is longer by 4.418 months. Therefore, letting fathers work under a flextime system would help promote breastfeeding practices in Japan

Sharing housework between husbands and wives: how to improve marital satisfaction for working wives in Japan

AbstractThis paper examines whether and how the marital satisfaction of Japanese couples is related to the housework the spouse performs. For single-earner couples, both husbands and wives are more satisfied with the other spouse ifthe wifeperforms the greater share of the housework on weekdays. In dual-earner couples, both husbands and wives experience higher spousal satisfaction when theotherspouse performs more housework on weekdays. Japanese dual-earner couples are unable to spend more time on housework, because wives are already performing a significant share of housework on weekdays while husbands are working long hours.JEL Classification:J12, J22</jats:p

Administration of PDE4 Inhibitors Suppressed the Pannus-Like Inflammation by Inhibition of Cytokine Production by Macrophages and Synovial Fibroblast Proliferation

A marked proliferation of synovial fibroblasts in joints leads to pannus formation in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Various kinds of cytokines are produced in the pannus. The purpose of this study is to elucidate the effects of phosphodiesterase 4 (PDE4) inhibitors in a new animal model for the evaluation of pannus formation and cytokine production in the pannus. Mice sensitized with methylated bovine serum albumin (mBSA) were challenged by subcutaneous implantation of a membrane filter soaked in mBSA solution in the back of the mice. Drugs were orally administered for 10 days. The granuloma formed around the filter was collected on day 11. It was chopped into pieces and cultured in vitro for 24 hr. The cytokines were measured in the supernatants. The type of cytokines produced in the granuloma was quite similar to those produced in pannus in RA. Both PDE4 inhibitors, KF66490 and SB207499, suppressed the production of IL-1β, TNF-α, and IL-12, and the increase in myeloperoxidase activity, a marker enzyme for neutrophils and hydroxyproline content. Compared to leflunomide, PDE4 inhibitors more strongly suppressed IL-12 production and the increase in myeloperoxidase activity. PDE4 inhibitors also inhibited lipopolysaccharide-induced TNF-α and IL-12 production from thioglycolate-induced murine peritoneal macrophages and the proliferation of rat synovial fibroblasts. These results indicate this model makes it easy to evaluate the effect of drugs on various cytokine productions in a granuloma without any purification step and may be a relevant model for evaluating novel antirheumatic drugs on pannus formation in RA. PDE4 inhibitors could have therapeutic effects on pannus formation in RA by inhibition of cytokine production by macrophages and synovial fibroblast proliferation