IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/amerec/v56y2011i2p35-46.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Happiness: A Jeffersonian Approach to Development Indicators

Author

Listed:
  • Jon Rezek
  • Graham Cano
  • Brent Evans

Abstract

International comparisons of societal development are traditionally based, at least partially, on per capita GDP. This paper develops an alternative approach to evaluating human progress using criteria outside the traditional income-based metrics. We evaluate national achievement using Thomas Jefferson's inalienable rights – Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness – as the development indicator. The results suggest that the northwestern European countries and their offshoots are most successful. Former Spanish territories, including the Philippines and those in Latin America, also perform well according to this metric. Eastern European and economically prosperous East Asian nations perform poorly.

Suggested Citation

  • Jon Rezek & Graham Cano & Brent Evans, 2011. "Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Happiness: A Jeffersonian Approach to Development Indicators," The American Economist, Sage Publications, vol. 56(2), pages 35-46, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:amerec:v:56:y:2011:i:2:p:35-46
    DOI: 10.1177/056943451105600206
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/056943451105600206
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/056943451105600206?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. M. L. Burstein, 1993. "Understanding Thomas Jefferson," Palgrave Macmillan Books, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-349-13115-0.
    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. Thomas Wai-Kee Yuen & Winnie Wan-Ling Chu, 2015. "Happiness in ASEAN member states," International Journal of Happiness and Development, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 2(1), pages 69-83.

    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.

      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:sae:amerec:v:56:y:2011:i:2:p:35-46. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://journals.sagepub.com/home/aex .

      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.