Why Happiness Hasn't Increased

Despite vast increases in income per capita, longer holidays, better health care, and dramatic technological increases over the past fifty years, the overall happiness of people in many countries has not increased much, if at all. Table 1, below, shows that the percentages of people claiming to be very happy, pretty happy, and not too happy have barely changed at all from 1975 to 1996. Richard Layard points out several reasons as to why this is the case.

Income and Happiness

Income plays a vital role in determining the happiness of people. Studies show that 41% of people in the top income quarter consider themselves very happy, while only 26% in the bottom income quarter feel the same. As Table 1 indicates, the happiness of people in 1996 is essentially the same as in 1975. This is shown even though per capita income has steadily increased since over that time period. Table 2 shows that in the United States, France, Japan, and the United Kingdom, annual income per capita has grown at an average rate of 4.1% from 1950-1973 and at an average rate of 2.0% from 1974-2000.

Conventional wisdom would lead one to believe that such increases would only increase the happiness of society. The results, however, show otherwise. Unhappiness has actually increased based on studies of depression. Studies have some that there has been an increase in depression. 15% of people now experience some form of clinical depression by their mid-30s. Additional income seems only to help happiness in countries where the average per capita income is below $15,000 a year. In countries where it is above $15,000 a year, extra income has little effect.