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ERIC Number: EJ804151
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2008-Sep
Pages: 33
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0303-8300
EISSN: N/A
Absolute Income, Relative Income, and Happiness
Ball, Richard; Chernova, Kateryna
Social Indicators Research, v88 n3 p497-529 Sep 2008
This paper uses data from the World Values Survey to investigate how an individual's self-reported happiness is related to (i) the level of her income in absolute terms, and (ii) the level of her income relative to other people in her country. The main findings are that (i) both absolute and relative income are positively and significantly correlated with happiness, (ii) quantitatively, changes in relative income have much larger effects on happiness than do changes in absolute income, and (iii) the effects on happiness of both absolute and relative income are small when compared to the effects of several non-pecuniary factors.
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A