The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being
Earth’s per capita energy use continues to grow, despite technological advances and widespread calls for reduction in energy consumption. The negative environmental consequences are well known: resource depletion, pollution, and global warming. However many remain reluctant to cut energy consumption...
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| Format: | Article |
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Springer Science and Business Media LLC
2020
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125432 |
| _version_ | 1811078056859664384 |
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| author | Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam Altman, Micah |
| author2 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Libraries |
| author_facet | Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Libraries Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam Altman, Micah |
| author_sort | Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Earth’s per capita energy use continues to grow, despite technological advances and widespread calls for reduction in energy consumption. The negative environmental consequences are well known: resource depletion, pollution, and global warming. However many remain reluctant to cut energy consumption because of the widespread, although, implicit, belief that a nation’s well being depends on its energy consumption. This article systematically examines the evidential support for the relationship between energy use and subjective well-being at the societal level, by integrating data from multiple sources, collected at multiple levels of government, and spanning four decades. This analysis reveals, surprisingly, that the most common measure of subjective well-being, life satisfaction, is unrelated to energy use -- whether measured at the national, state or county level. The nil relationship between happiness and energy use is reminiscent of the well-known Easterlin Paradox, however the causal mechanisms responsible to each remain in question. We discuss the possible causes for the Happiness-Energy paradox and potential policy implications. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:52:42Z |
| format | Article |
| id | mit-1721.1/125432 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T10:52:42Z |
| publishDate | 2020 |
| publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/1254322022-09-27T15:41:11Z The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam Altman, Micah Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Libraries Earth’s per capita energy use continues to grow, despite technological advances and widespread calls for reduction in energy consumption. The negative environmental consequences are well known: resource depletion, pollution, and global warming. However many remain reluctant to cut energy consumption because of the widespread, although, implicit, belief that a nation’s well being depends on its energy consumption. This article systematically examines the evidential support for the relationship between energy use and subjective well-being at the societal level, by integrating data from multiple sources, collected at multiple levels of government, and spanning four decades. This analysis reveals, surprisingly, that the most common measure of subjective well-being, life satisfaction, is unrelated to energy use -- whether measured at the national, state or county level. The nil relationship between happiness and energy use is reminiscent of the well-known Easterlin Paradox, however the causal mechanisms responsible to each remain in question. We discuss the possible causes for the Happiness-Energy paradox and potential policy implications. 2020-05-22T20:29:12Z 2020-05-22T20:29:12Z 2019-03 2018-04 Article http://purl.org/eprint/type/JournalArticle 1871-2584 1871-2576 https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125432 Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam and Micah Altman. "The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being." Applied Research in Quality of Life (March 2019) http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11482-019-09719-y Applied Research in Quality of Life Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/ application/pdf Springer Science and Business Media LLC Micah Altman |
| spellingShingle | Okulicz-Kozaryn, Adam Altman, Micah The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title | The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title_full | The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title_fullStr | The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title_full_unstemmed | The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title_short | The Happiness-Energy Paradox: Energy Use is Unrelated to Subjective Well-Being |
| title_sort | happiness energy paradox energy use is unrelated to subjective well being |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/125432 |
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