Is happiness U-shaped everywhere? Age and subjective well-being in 145 countries
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Is happiness U-shaped everywhere? Age and subjective well-being in 145 countries David G. Blanchflower 1 Received: 30 December 2019 / Accepted: 19 August 2020/ # Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract A large empirical literature has debated the existence of a U-shaped happiness-age curve. This paper re-examines the relationship between various measures of well-being and age in 145 countries, including 109 developing countries, controlling for education and marital and labor force status, among others, on samples of individuals under the age of 70. The U-shape of the curve is forcefully confirmed, with an age minimum, or nadir, in midlife around age 50 in separate analyses for developing and advanced countries as well as for the continent of Africa. The happiness curve seems to be everywhere. While panel data are largely unavailable for this issue, and the findings using such data largely confirm the cross-section results, the paper discusses insights on why cohort effects do not drive the findings. I find the age of the minima has risen over time in Europe and the USA. Keywords Well-being . Happiness . U-shape in age JEL codes I31 . P51 . D6
1 Introduction In this paper, I report on the existence of a midlife nadir in well-being. The analysis is conducted mostly at the country level with happiness and life satisfaction variables, although a number of other measures are used that relate to a household’s financial situation and their living standards, satisfaction with local services, and the macro economy. All produce U-shapes in age.
Responsible editor: Klaus F. Zimmermann
* David G. Blanchflower [email protected]
1
Dartmouth College, NBER, Bloomberg, GLO, Hanover, USA
D. G. Blanchflower
Using country-level data, I identify U-shapes in age in 145 advanced and developing countries.1 This includes 138 of the 193 member countries of the United Nations. I find this happiness curve (Rauch 2019) for 109 developing2 and thirty-six advanced countries based on an analysis where I control for gender, education, marital and labor force status, and time. I use data from fourteen different survey series. I use these data to estimate 477 separate country-level estimates that reach a minimum, on average, at age 48.3.3 There are 241 estimates from developed countries with an average minimum at age 46.7 and 236 estimates from developing countries with an average minimum at 49.9. I examine cross-section time series data at the country level rather than examining panel data. Longitudinal data files that have a long run of years are restricted to the UK (BHPS and NCDS), Germany (GSOEP), and Australia (HILDA). In part, the concern with these surveys is non-random attrition bias and hence missing values over time with the least happy dropping out or even dying, which may well introduce measurement error. There is a small literature looking at age effects using panel data that I interpret as largely supportive of U-shapes, although there are some technical issues that must be considered. My
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