| Summary: | This study seeks to investigate the economic antecedents of happiness by employing the Mean Group (MG), Pooled Mean Group (PMG) and the Dynamic Fixed Effects (DFE) estimators to analyse a set of macro panel data on selected OECD countries for 40 years from 1973 to 2012. The results show evidence that income and unemployment have a favourable impact on happiness, while happiness is hindered by inflation and income inequality. Surprisingly, the study revealed that institutional quality is not a significant antecedent of happiness. It is worth noting the importance of the reference group theory or relative theory of happiness and the set-point theory of happiness in explaining the role played by income, unemployment, inflation, income inequality and institutional quality in explaining human well-being.
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