Abstract
This research indicates that a comprehensive measure of economic well-being based on permanent income, annuitized net worth, and household economic demands, performs better as a predictor of psychological well-being than conventional measures of economic well-being, particularly current reported income. Statistically, the results are significant yet the percentage of psychological well-being variance explained by the measures of economic well-being is very small. The average level of happiness varied only a small amount across quintile categories of each of the measures of economic well-being. That is to say, a substantial number of respondents in the lowest and next lowest quintiles of the measures of economic well-being expressed as high a level of happiness as respondents in the upper two quintiles of economic well-being.
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This research was funded by a grant from the National Institutes of Health/Mental Health #MH41783-02.
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Mullis, R.J. Measures of economic well-being as predictors of psychological well-being. Soc Indic Res 26, 119–135 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00304395
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00304395