Economic growth and the human lot.

In 1974, Richard A. Easterlin, a coauthor of the work by Easterlin et al. (1) in PNAS, published a seminal article (2) that has generated a huge literature. It sought to explain why the happiness score in the United States (and elsewhere) had stayed roughly constant, whereas income per capita had tr...

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Main Author: Knight, J
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2012
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author Knight, J
author_facet Knight, J
author_sort Knight, J
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description In 1974, Richard A. Easterlin, a coauthor of the work by Easterlin et al. (1) in PNAS, published a seminal article (2) that has generated a huge literature. It sought to explain why the happiness score in the United States (and elsewhere) had stayed roughly constant, whereas income per capita had trended up. This evidence has come to be known as the Easterlin Paradox. His explanation was that economic growth has a positive effect on happiness with other things being equal; however, it also raises aspirations, and aspirations have a negative effect. Aspirations are determined by society, particularly reference group income. The combination of these two effects gives rise to a Hedonic Treadmill.
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spelling oxford-uuid:0a79259b-3ca3-4501-b162-bdc1b9718f652022-03-26T09:24:02ZEconomic growth and the human lot.Journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:0a79259b-3ca3-4501-b162-bdc1b9718f65EnglishDepartment of Economics - ePrintsNational Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2012Knight, JIn 1974, Richard A. Easterlin, a coauthor of the work by Easterlin et al. (1) in PNAS, published a seminal article (2) that has generated a huge literature. It sought to explain why the happiness score in the United States (and elsewhere) had stayed roughly constant, whereas income per capita had trended up. This evidence has come to be known as the Easterlin Paradox. His explanation was that economic growth has a positive effect on happiness with other things being equal; however, it also raises aspirations, and aspirations have a negative effect. Aspirations are determined by society, particularly reference group income. The combination of these two effects gives rise to a Hedonic Treadmill.
spellingShingle Knight, J
Economic growth and the human lot.
title Economic growth and the human lot.
title_full Economic growth and the human lot.
title_fullStr Economic growth and the human lot.
title_full_unstemmed Economic growth and the human lot.
title_short Economic growth and the human lot.
title_sort economic growth and the human lot
work_keys_str_mv AT knightj economicgrowthandthehumanlot