IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/soceco/v37y2008i3p1153-1167.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Economic convergence and life satisfaction in the European Union

Author

Listed:
  • Welsch, Heinz
  • Bonn, Udo

Abstract

The issue of convergence or divergence in the European Union (EU) is usually viewed from a macroeconomic perspective, using indicators such as the income per head, the unemployment rate and the inflation rate. Little attention has been paid to the possibility of an associated convergence in 'well-being' across countries. Since recent literature has shown that subjective well-being (life satisfaction, 'happiness') is significantly affected by macroeconomic variables, it is natural to ask not only whether or not subjective well-being converges, but also, whether, how and to what extent this process is linked to macroeconomic convergence. In this paper we use self-rated life satisfaction elicited in large scale surveys to address these questions. We find evidence of convergence of life satisfaction across the member states of the EU, which can be attributed to a considerable extent to the convergence in macroeconomic conditions. Among the various macroeconomic indicators, the convergence in inflation rates has played a major role for the convergence in life satisfaction.

Suggested Citation

  • Welsch, Heinz & Bonn, Udo, 2008. "Economic convergence and life satisfaction in the European Union," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 1153-1167, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:37:y:2008:i:3:p:1153-1167
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6W5H-4NJG40H-1/1/46f46aaf262c4ee00160e0e56e888245
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert J. MacCulloch & Rafael Di Tella & Andrew J. Oswald, 2001. "Preferences over Inflation and Unemployment: Evidence from Surveys of Happiness," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(1), pages 335-341, March.
    2. Clark, Andrew E & Oswald, Andrew J, 1994. "Unhappiness and Unemployment," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 104(424), pages 648-659, May.
    3. Martin Ravallion & Michael Lokshin, 2001. "Identifying Welfare Effects from Subjective Questions," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 68(271), pages 335-357, August.
    4. Bruno S. Frey & Alois Stutzer, 2002. "What Can Economists Learn from Happiness Research?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 402-435, June.
    5. Hein, Eckhard & Truger, Achim, 2005. "European Monetary Union: nominal convergence, real divergence and slow growth?," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 16(1), pages 7-33, March.
    6. Rafael Di Tella & Robert J. MacCulloch & Andrew J. Oswald, 2003. "The Macroeconomics of Happiness," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(4), pages 809-827, November.
    7. Sendhil Mullainathan & Marianne Bertrand, 2001. "Do People Mean What They Say? Implications for Subjective Survey Data," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(2), pages 67-72, May.
    8. Simon Sosvilla-Rivero & Salvador Gil-Pareja, 2004. "Price convergence in the European Union," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(1), pages 39-47.
    9. Daniel Kahneman & Peter P. Wakker & Rakesh Sarin, 1997. "Back to Bentham? Explorations of Experienced Utility," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 112(2), pages 375-406.
    10. Neumayer, Eric, 2003. "Beyond income: convergence in living standards, big time," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 14(3), pages 275-296, September.
    11. Ville Kaitila, 2004. "Convergence of real GDP per capita in the EU15. How do the Accession Countries fit in?," Economics Working Papers 025, European Network of Economic Policy Research Institutes.
    12. Hobijn, Bart & Franses, Philip Hans, 2001. "Are living standards converging?," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 12(2), pages 171-200, July.
    13. Easterlin, Richard A., 1974. "Does Economic Growth Improve the Human Lot? Some Empirical Evidence," MPRA Paper 111773, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Charles I. Jones, 1997. "On the Evolution of the World Income Distribution," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 11(3), pages 19-36, Summer.
    15. Liliana Winkelmann & Rainer Winkelmann, 1998. "Why Are the Unemployed So Unhappy?Evidence from Panel Data," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 65(257), pages 1-15, February.
    16. Giles, David E.A. & Feng, Hui, 2005. "Output and well-being in industrialized nations in the second half of the 20th century: testing for convergence using fuzzy clustering analysis," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 16(2), pages 285-308, June.
    17. Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell & Paul Frijters, 2004. "How Important is Methodology for the estimates of the determinants of Happiness?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(497), pages 641-659, July.
    18. Michael Hagerty & Ruut Veenhoven, 2003. "Wealth and Happiness Revisited – Growing National Income Does Go with Greater Happiness," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 64(1), pages 1-27, October.
    19. Ravallion, Martin & Lokshin, Michael, 2001. "Identifying Welfare Effects from Subjective Questions," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 68(271), pages 335-357, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Milena Nikolova & Boris Nikolaev, 2017. "Does Joining the EU Make You Happy? Evidence from Bulgaria and Romania," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 18(6), pages 1593-1623, December.
    2. Eileen Trzcinski & Elke Holst, 2010. "Interrelationships among Locus of Control and Years in Management and Unemployment: Differences by Gender," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 974, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    3. Paola Andrea Barrientos Quiroga, 2011. "Convergence Clubs in Latin America: A Hisotical Appoach," Development Research Working Paper Series 01/2011, Institute for Advanced Development Studies.
    4. Peter Meer, 2014. "Gender, Unemployment and Subjective Well-Being: Why Being Unemployed Is Worse for Men than for Women," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 115(1), pages 23-44, January.
    5. Ingemar Johansson Sevä & Stig Vinberg & Mikael Nordenmark & Mattias Strandh, 2016. "Subjective well-being among the self-employed in Europe: macroeconomy, gender and immigrant status," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 46(2), pages 239-253, February.
    6. Genovaitė Liobikienė & Justina Mandravickaitė, 2013. "Convergence of new members of the EU: changes in household consumption expenditure structure regarding environmental impact during the prosperous period," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 15(2), pages 407-427, April.
    7. Yuhan Wang & Zenghui Huo & Dongpo Li & Mei Zhang, 2022. "Evaluation of Common Prosperity Level and Regional Difference Analysis along the Yangtze River Economic Belt," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(19), pages 1-16, September.
    8. Paola Andrea Barrientos Quiroga, 2010. "Convergence Patterns in Latin America," Economics Working Papers 2010-15, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    9. Agnieszka Baer-Nawrocka, 2018. "Konwergencja i nierówności dobrobytu ekonomicznego gospodarstw domowych w krajach Unii Europejskiej," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 3, pages 103-124.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alois Stutzer & Bruno S. Frey, 2008. "Stress that Doesn't Pay: The Commuting Paradox," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 110(2), pages 339-366, June.
    2. Andrew E. Clark & Paul Frijters & Michael A. Shields, 2006. "Income and happiness: Evidence, explanations and economic implications," PSE Working Papers halshs-00590436, HAL.
    3. David G. Blanchflower & Andrew J. Oswald, 2004. "Money, Sex and Happiness: An Empirical Study," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 106(3), pages 393-415, October.
    4. Welsch, Heinz, 2007. "Environmental welfare analysis: A life satisfaction approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(3-4), pages 544-551, May.
    5. Welsch, Heinz, 2006. "Environment and happiness: Valuation of air pollution using life satisfaction data," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 58(4), pages 801-813, July.
    6. Blanchflower, David G. & Oswald, Andrew J., 2004. "Well-being over time in Britain and the USA," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(7-8), pages 1359-1386, July.
    7. Bruno S. Frey & Alois Stutzer, 2002. "What Can Economists Learn from Happiness Research?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 40(2), pages 402-435, June.
    8. Roberta Distante, 2013. "Subjective Well-Being, Income and Relative Concerns in the UK," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 113(1), pages 81-105, August.
    9. Popova, Olga, 2014. "Can religion insure against aggregate shocks to happiness? The case of transition countries," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 804-818.
    10. Leonardo Becchetti & Alessandra Pelloni, 2013. "What are we learning from the life satisfaction literature?," International Review of Economics, Springer;Happiness Economics and Interpersonal Relations (HEIRS), vol. 60(2), pages 113-155, June.
    11. Claudia Senik, 2005. "Income distribution and well‐being: what can we learn from subjective data?," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 19(1), pages 43-63, February.
    12. Leonardo Becchetti & Elena Giachin Ricca & Alessandra Pelloni, 2009. "The 60s Turnaround as a Test on the Causal Relationship between Sociability and Happiness," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 209, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    13. Di Tella, Rafael & MacCulloch, Robert, 2008. "Gross national happiness as an answer to the Easterlin Paradox?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(1), pages 22-42, April.
    14. Geeta G. Kingdon & John Knight, 2003. "Well-being poverty versus income poverty and capabilities poverty?," CSAE Working Paper Series 2003-16, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    15. KNIGHT, John & SONG, Lina & GUNATILAKA, Ramani, 2009. "Subjective well-being and its determinants in rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 635-649, December.
    16. Senik, Claudia, 2004. "When information dominates comparison: Learning from Russian subjective panel data," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(9-10), pages 2099-2123, August.
    17. Jan-Emmanuel De Neve & George Ward & Femke De Keulenaer & Bert Van Landeghem & Georgios Kavetsos & Michael I. Norton, 2018. "The Asymmetric Experience of Positive and Negative Economic Growth: Global Evidence Using Subjective Well-Being Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(2), pages 362-375, May.
    18. Ferrer-i-Carbonell, Ada & Gowdy, John M., 2007. "Environmental degradation and happiness," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 509-516, January.
    19. Rehdanz, Katrin & Maddison, David, 2005. "Climate and happiness," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 111-125, January.
      • Katrin Rehdanz & David J. Maddison, 2003. "Climate and Happiness," Working Papers FNU-20, Research unit Sustainability and Global Change, Hamburg University, revised Apr 2003.
    20. Heinz Welsch & Jan Kühling, 2009. "Using Happiness Data For Environmental Valuation: Issues And Applications," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(2), pages 385-406, April.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:37:y:2008:i:3:p:1153-1167. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620175 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.