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A Study: Income and Happiness Across Europe: Do Reference Values Matter?

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A STUDY: INCOME AND HAPPINESS ACROSS EUROPE: DO REFERENCE VALUES MATTER?
Contents
Summary 2 The Silver Lining of Materialism: The Impact of Luxury Consumption on Subjective Well-Being 3 Data used for analysis 5 Econometric Model 6 Critical Reflection 8 Reference List 11

A Study: Income and happiness across Europe: Do reference values matter?
Summary

The authors in this study - Guglielmo Maria Caporale, Yannis Georgellis, Nicholas Tsitsianis and Ya Ping Yin - assess the relationship between income and subjective well-being; by tracing back to works of Adam Smith, Karl Marx, Veblen and Duesenberry, the authors revive significant attention to the neoclassical economic theory that portrays well-being and absolute income to be highly correlated.

The data was retrieved from the European Social Survey (ESS) to examine a potential relationship between income and happiness (self-reported satisfaction), the authors execute their study across 19 European Countries.

With utilisation of Easterlin (1974) as their seminal paper, the research draws attention to the Easterlin Paradox (Easterlin, 1995) that suggests there is no relationship between economic expansion in industrialised countries and its average level of happiness. The authors look to assess topical contradictory findings that conclude absolute income is correlated with levels of happiness (e.g.: Frijters et al., 2004).

The research purpose of this paper was to re-examine this controversial link for a number of European countries, specific consideration was given to whether relative income was a chief determinant of well-being. The results show that for the sample of 19 countries, income is positively correlated with well-being and life satisfaction. However, reference income wields a negative effect on individual wellbeing. This means that the overall results support both the absolute and

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