The Economic Problem of Happiness: Keynes on Happiness and Economics

By stressing the substantial continuity of vision between John Maynard Keynes’s early unpublished essays and his more mature writings, the paper discusses Keynes’s ethics and focuses on his thoughts about happiness. In particular, we emphasize the anti-utilitarianism of Keynes’s vision and his belief that material wealth is but a precondition to enjoy the possibilities of a good life, and direct attention to problems of incommensurability raised by the multidimensional nature of happiness as considered by Keynes. We then argue that the rediscovery of Keynes’s legacy in this respect may be a precious counterweight to the most controversial aspects of today’s happiness research.     

所得、快乐与赋税:基于黄有光快乐经济学的审视

根据黄有光的快乐经济学,人们追求的最终目的是提高福利,因而经济学探讨的中心问题是福利或快乐.由于快乐是一种主观感受,因而GDP并不是衡量福利的一个有效指标.在现代社会中,生活品质不仅与私人品的消费有关,更与公共品的质量和数量有关.因此,在未来社会中,公共开支确实会且应该不断增长.为了应对不断增加的公共支出,政府就需要提高累进税,尤其是提高钻石商品的税收.     

Institutions,parental selection,and locus of control

Locus of control, that is, people’s perception of how much influence they have over their lives, is an important predictor for economic outcomes – earnings, health and education, to name a few. This article uses difference-in-differences analysis to investigate the importance of the institutional environment for the development of locus of control, using the fall of the Berlin Wall as exogenous shock to the educational system in East Germany. Using data from the German Socioeconomic Panel (SOEP), we find that women showed less external locus of control following the fall of the Berlin Wall but less clear results for men.     

Money, Sex and Happiness: An Empirical Study

The links between income, sexual behavior and reported happiness are studied using recent data on a sample of 16,000 adult Americans. The paper finds that sexual activity enters strongly positively in happiness equations. Higher income does not buy more sex or more sexual partners. Married people have more sex than those who are single, divorced, widowed or separated. The happiness‐maximizing number of sexual partners in the previous year is calculated to be 1. Highly educated females tend to have fewer sexual partners. Homosexuality has no statistically significant effect on happiness.     

快乐品牌的经济学分析

人类消费进入更高层次的情感消费时代,尤其以娱乐为首的快乐消费已经成为我们生活必不可缺的组成部分.消费者对快乐的需求催生了一大批快乐品牌.本文运用经济学偏好理论阐释快乐内涵、特征及产生根源,并运用品牌经济学原理对快乐品牌进行分析发现,成功的快乐品牌满足消费者对"快乐"需求这一单一利益点.快乐情感的特性决定品牌品类具有高度敏感性.正确的品牌延伸策略使得目标顾客对品牌记忆持久.     

国内外幸福指数研究现状评述及展望

从概念、影响因素、意义及其与GDP关系四个方面对国内外幸福指数的研究现状进行梳理;对幸福指数测度指标体系、测度模型及目前的实证研究状况进行总结归纳,发现现有研究成果的不足,今后应对幸福指数的相关理论问题进行深化研究,着力加强其理论框架体系的研究,注重对幸福指数进行多层面、多学科的综合集成研究,加强面向实践的应用研究和对策研究。     

Happiness and declining inframarginal values

I accept the broad findings of happiness studies on the longitudinal and cross-sectional relationships between income and happiness, and argue that standard demand curve analysis is inconsistent with those findings. This inconsistency is overcome with a simple dynamic modification to the standard demand curve that assumes the psychological adaptation to consuming a good is captured by declining values of inframarginal units. I argue that this modification is consistent with two evolutionary considerations related to happiness and that it has interesting implications for such things as anticipation and happiness, apparent anomalies in discounting the future, the connection between World War II and the end of the Great Depression, and the possibility of increasing our happiness by moderating our consumption.      

Perspectives from the Happiness Literature and the Role of New Instruments for Policy Analysis

After having been ignored for a long time by economists, happinessis becoming an object of serious research in 21st century economics.In Section 2 we sketch the present status of happiness economics.In Section 3 we consider the practical applicability of happinesseconomics, retaining the assumption of ordinal individual utilities.In Section 4 we introduce a cardinal utility concept, whichseems to us the natural consequence of the happiness economicsmethodology. In Section 5 we sketch how this approach can leadto a normative approach to policy problems that is admissiblefrom a positivist point of view. Section 6 concludes. (JEL codes:B21, B41, D63, I31, I38)     

大学生创业压力源、控制感与倦怠关系研究

本文对大学生的创业压力源、控制感和倦怠的构思结构及其三者之间的关系进行了探讨。首先对来自长三角地区、服务行业和IT行业的10名不同背景的初创企业的创业大学生进行了半结构化访谈,其次对访谈记录进行了内容分析,在文献研究和访谈研究的基础上设计了创业大学生初创企业压力源问卷,对获取的192份预测数据和229份正式测量数据进行了统计分析。研究结果表明：大学生创业压力源存在五因素结构模型,包括创业卷入、知识储备、竞争强度、资源需求和管理责任;这5个因素构成了创业大学生创业压力源的概念模型。创业压力源对倦怠各维度有显著性预测作用;控制感在创业压力源与倦怠关系中起到调节作用。同时,对大学生创业压力源与倦怠不同水平的感知差异在两种不同创业教育模式下也进行了比较。     

基于快乐指数的“个人–团队”动态匹配模型研究——以科研团队为例

个人–团队匹配模型已经改变了团队模式下人力资源的选拔方法,但不足的是不能保证"个人–团队"能够动态匹配。已有的研究发现,员工快乐与否直接影响着团队的绩效,并且员工快乐这个元素是呈动态变化的。建立了团队快乐指数的评价指标体系,并通过构建"个人–团队"动态匹配模型来影响团队成员快乐的因素,达到间接、动态地调整"个人–团队"绩效关系,使个人与团队之间得到双赢的绩效目标。     

Choices, situations, and happiness

This article explores some conceptual issues in the study of well-being using the traditional economic approach of inferring preferences solely from choice behavior. We argue that choice behavior alone can never reveal which situations make people better off, even with unlimited data and under the maintained hypothesis of 100% rational choice. Ancillary assumptions or additional forms of data such as happiness measures are always needed. With such ancillary assumptions and additional data, however, the use of revealed preference to study well-being can be significantly improved, so that the choices people make can jointly identify preferences, mistakes, and well-being.     

The concept of Total Economic Value of environment: A reconsideration within a hierarchical rationality

Beyond a purely typological distinction between use, option and non-use values, these different environmental values are not treated differently within the concept of Total Economic Value. When expressed in monetary terms from individual preferences, these values are incorporated into a sole approach reasoning in terms of utility.In this paper, we argue that option and non-use values stem from more different levels of choice problems than use values and thus, must be apprehended in a multidimensional framework. We distinguish three levels of choice problem to which various rationality criteria of Social Cost-Benefit Analysis are attached. This allows us to make a distinction between the different components of the value of the environment according to the level of problems to which they're relevant. Thus, we propose to re-interpret the concept of Total Economic Value, particularly option and non-use values, within this multidimensional framework. We present an application of this framework for the selection of preferred highway route (highway A85 in France).     

Hypoglycemia: An overview of fear of hypoglycemia,quality-of-life,and impact on costs

Abstract

Background:

The clinical goal in the treatment of diabetes is to achieve good glycemic control. Tight glycemic control achieved with intensive glucose lowering treatment reduces the risk of long-term micro- and macro-vascular complications of diabetes, resulting in an improvement in quality-of-life for the patient and decreased healthcare costs. The positive impact of good glycemic control is, however, counterbalanced by the negative impact of an increased incidence of hypoglycemia.

Methods:

A search of PubMed was conducted to identify published literature on the impact of hypoglycemia, both on patient quality-of-life and associated costs to the healthcare system and society.

Results:

In people with type 1 or type 2 diabetes, hypoglycemia is associated with a reduction in quality-of-life, increased fear and anxiety, reduced productivity, and increased healthcare costs. Fear of hypoglycemia may promote compensatory behaviors in order to avoid hypoglycemia, such as decreased insulin doses, resulting in poor glycemic control and an increased risk of serious health consequences. Every non-severe event may be associated with a utility loss in the range of 0.0033–0.0052 over 1 year, further contributing to the negative impact.

Limitations:

This review is intended to provide an overview of hypoglycemia in diabetes and its impact on patients and society, and consequently it is not a comprehensive evaluation of all studies reporting hypoglycemic episodes.

Conclusion:

To provide the best possible care for patients and a cost-effective treatment strategy for healthcare decision-makers, a treatment that provides good glycemic control with a limited risk of hypoglycemia would be a welcome addition to diabetes management options.     

The concept of freedom and its relation to economic development--a critical appreciation of the work of Amartya Sen

Following a brief review of the conception of freedom as employedin economic discourse, this paper focuses on the evolution ofthe concept of freedom in the work of Amartya Sen. It tracesthe development of Sen's thought from the capability analysisof the late 1970s to his more recent separation of freedom intoits opportunity and process aspects. While broadly appreciativeof Sen's development of the concept of positive freedom, thepaper identifies some difficulties arising from his definitionof capability as a set of options as well as from his separationof the opportunity and process aspects of freedom. Aspects ofthe relationship between Sen's conception of freedom and thatof Marx are discussed briefly in the context of Sen's recentdiscussion of the market as a source of freedom.     

企业集团财务控制模式的现实选择

财务控制模式选择是否适当对于企业持续经营和健康发展至关重要.本文重点分析了三种典型财务控制模式的特点,并在此基础上比较了这三种典型财务控制模式各自的优缺点.结合企业集团的发展战略、发展阶段、产业选择、子公司对母公司战略的影响程度等影响企业财务控制模式选择的因素,认为现阶段我国企业集团财务控制模式的现实选择是采取集权与分权相结合的混合财务控制模式.     

Was Bentham a primitive rational choice theory predecessor?

This paper challenges the view of Jeremy Bentham as a primitive predecessor of rational choice theory and welfare economics. The psychological hedonism in Bentham is of a rather weak form – net pleasure motivates behaviour, but we are not always capable of its maximisation. Thus, the outcome of our choices is not necessarily in our best interest and the aggregation of our revealed preferences is not necessarily a good indicator of general happiness. The bottom line is that the underpinnings of Bentham's utilitarianism are better aligned with contemporary psychological theory than previously thought, which puts his ethical thinking on firmer ground.     

A behavioural analysis of the subsistence standard of living

Subsistence is analysed as an endogenous variable, contraryto its conventional exogenous treatment. It is postulated thatthe subsistence-livers perceive their own standard of subsistence,direct their earnings behaviour towards attaining, maintainingor exceeding this standard and, thus, reveal the standard throughthis behaviour. The labour supply function of the working poor,which displays a forward-falling segment at low wages and anupward-rising segment at higher wages, is hypothesised to offermeasures of subsistence and survival standards. The conceptsare rationalised using Sen's concept of ‘freedom of choice’and Arrow's concept of ‘freedom as flexibility’.It is argued that at below-subsistence living, individuals lackfreedom of flexibility in choosing their preferences and thussuffer the loss of freedom of choice—while subsistenceoffers a reasonable minimum of this freedom, the freedom iscompletely lost at the lowest survival standard.     

Happiness,income and poverty

There is considerable evidence from a variety of sources to suggest that well-being is a function of relative income. These findings have been used to explain the Easterlin Paradox, whereby a rise in income for all does not lead to a rise in average happiness in a country (even though the cross section relationship between income and happiness is positive). This relativity of utility has led to calls for policy to focus away from GDP. I here first discuss some of the evidence that well-being is indeed relative in income, but then consider two relatively little-analysed issues to suggest that there may continue to be a role for GDP per capita in happiness-based policy: the inequality of subjective well-being, and the specific case of those in income poverty.     

Happiness, Economy and Institutions

Institutional factors in the form of direct democracy (via initiatives and referenda) and federal structure (local autonomy) systematically and sizeably raise self-reported individual well-being in a cross-regional econometric analysis. This positive effect can be attributed to political outcomes closer to voters' preferences, as well as to the procedural utility of political participation possibilities. Moreover, the results of previous microeconometric well-being functions for other countries are generally supported. Unemployment has a strongly depressing effect on happiness. A higher income level raises happiness, however, only to a small extent.     

Income, Health and Happiness

This article utilises unit record data from the 1989–90 National Health Survey to explore the relationships between low income and perceptions of health and happiness. After describing how the key variables were constructed, attention is focused on the incidence of perceived poor health and unhappiness among those individuals living in income units on either side of a poverty threshold related to the Henderson poverty line. The results reveal that those in poverty generally have poorer health and are less happy than those above the poverty threshold. The observed differences are statistically significant for many income unit types, particularly non-aged single people and couples with children. Attention then turns to exploring how health and happiness vary across the deciles of the income distribution. Again, significant differences are revealed, particularly when more sophisticated distributional measures are employed. Finally, consideration is given to the possibility that the results reflect reverse causality, and that the observed correlations incorporate the role of intervening variables.