The prominence of happiness studies has grown drastically since the 1990s and it has been argued that governments ought to adopt happiness, and distribution of, as key measures for national achievement. An array of happiness indicators have been adopted across studies to determine levels and rankings of happiness among nations. Of these determinants, economic factors such as income have one of the greatest effects on happiness, but the application of income benefits differ among countries from various parts of the world. The purpose of this paper is to investigate determinants of happiness in tools for happiness measurement across existing studies and ultimately answer the question of how economic determinants of happiness affect countries from differing levels of development. To contribute to the existing conversation of happiness indicators, this paper will explore the influence of economic indicators of happiness in Thailand, the land of smiles, and the United States, a developed nation struggling with happiness, and argue that happiness as a result of economic factors is weighed relatively in both countries but has more negative effects in the United States and reflects more positively on happiness in Thailand due to the extent of comparison to others.
Measuring Happiness
A landmark in the stride for attention to happiness is Bhutan’s adoption of gross national happiness (GNH) as its development indicator. Gross domestic product (GDP) remains the measurement of development for the remainder of the world. The Kingdom of Bhutan, after adopting GNH its main domestic policy goal since 1972, created the Gross National Happiness Index. The GNH Index investigates nine domains to conclude a happiness score: psychological wellbeing, time use, community vitality, cultural diversity, ecological resilience, living standard, health, education and good governance, under which are thirty-three indicators. While Buddhism influenced the framework for GNH, over time, empirical research on happiness, positive psychology and well-being has validated the tool for universal measurement. In 2016, Thailand adopted a Gross National Happiness Center to put GNH into practice nationally.
Globally measuring happiness is the 2018 World Happiness Report by the United Nations which, using data from the Gallop World Poll, measures GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy at birth, freedom to make life choices, generosity, perceptions of corruption and negative effect combined to measure national levels of happiness. To measure social support for opinion-based questions, the question, “If you were in trouble, do you have relatives or friends you can count on to help you whenever you need them, or not?” was asked. The question, “Are you satisfied or dissatisfied with your freedom to choose what you do with your life?” defines the score for freedom to make life choices. Generosity is measured by respondents reporting whether or not they donated money to a charity in the past month, and lastly, perceptions of corruption are measured by responses to the questions, “Is corruption widespread throughout government or not?” and “Is corruption widespread within businesses or not?” Issues with this construction of measurement will be noted later in this paper.
Just as Carlquist asserted that while term “happiness” may be interchangeable with “good life” and “satisfaction,” the assumption that this understanding is the same across the world should be avoided. With acknowledgement that the understanding of happiness differs across cultures, it is not fair to expect happiness indicators to be consistent across cultures either. Consistent among existing research is the consensus that the terms “happiness” and “subjective well-being,” which refers to one’s ability to evaluate their lives cognitively, are interchangeable.
The World Happiness Report of 2018 awarded Thailand, a not-yet developed nation, with a score of 6.072 out of ten (ranked forty-sixth out of 156 countries), and the United States with a score of 6.886 (eighteenth in ranking). With the indicating questions stated above, though arguably adequate for creating a general report of nations worldwide, overrides critical details in measuring happiness country-specific. For example, aside from GDP being an indicator of happiness, as the World Happiness Report adopts, considering a lower GDP may represent unhappy workers, or inversely, happy workers in countries with smaller economies, among other overlooked possibilities, monetary donations as a happiness indicator do not serve as an indicator of happiness in many countries for various reasons. For example, consider religious requirements to donate money. In the case of Thailand, a predominately Buddhist country, karma drives many Thai beliefs; the practice of donating karmic benefits earned by the good deed of one Thai is common, but it is not a monetary donation, therefore uncounted. Adversely, while monetary donations in the United States may indicate wealth, they might not serve as a cause or effect for happiness; they may be merely an opportunity for a tax write-off.
Measurement and Practice of Happiness in Thailand
Further studies have investigated the presence of happiness and indicators of such specific to Thai people. In 2000, Thailand developed Thai Mental Health Indicators (TMHI) to measure health and happiness. Studies have since proven correlations of the domains of “mental state” to measures of happiness, or more appropriate for Buddhist Thailand, satisfaction, among Thai people. While studies that apply TMHI measures to Thais do not measure economic factors, the social support results justify results of Thai studies that measure economic factors. One main study on happiness with TMHI measurements found that social support largely correlates with Thai happiness. Supporting this is Dr. Kumar’s research regarding the primal equation for a social brain, which claims “attachment to tribe = life” and “abandonment from tribe = death.” Applied to modern happiness, humans follow a bio-psycho-social strategy for happiness, where human connectedness is a requirement for survival and ultimately, happiness. People need human connection and a network of support to survive.
Economically, a recent Thai study revealed that quality of work life, defined by satisfaction with a balance of work, has the largest effect on happiness. This finding relates to both Thai importance on social connectedness as aforementioned, as work-life balance allows for personal lives with family and friends (which translates to happiness), along with Thai goals of overall balance, a strive instilled by Buddhism. In Buddhism, moderation and contentment are one’s prime goals, as opposed to seeking more, or pleasure chasing. This is important in happiness studies in Thailand because this suggests Thais strive for a balance between two extremes, extreme unhappiness or dissatisfaction with life, and extreme happiness, which is unrealistic, as rushes of happiness are just that, fleeting rushes. This contentment is proven in research of happiness level of Thais, where the average happiness level of Thais is around the middle of the scale, balanced between unhappy and extremely happy. How this relates to economic measures of Thais is that as long as one has enough to survive, the rest of happiness derived from monetary factors is relative, but emphasis is based on satisfaction and human connectedness.
In a study measuring which factor influences Thai happiness most (between economic security, ownership of household, quality of neighborhood, physical health, or relative poverty to neighbors), the strongest predictor of happiness proved to be the feeling of relative poverty to neighbors, which the study explained to represent a feeling of self-sufficiency. In Thailand, a nation with a wide rich-poor gap, this study suggests as long as one feels they are as poor as their neighbors, not less, they remain satisfied. Relative poverty to neighbors and feeling of self-sufficiency reflects Buddhist teachings explained prior; satisfaction is what one trains their mind to attain, and self-sufficiency is key to accepting what one has and being satisfied. The relative versus absolute income hypothesis has been tested in other nations as well, yielding the same results.
Measurement and Practice of Happiness in the United States
While the United States has advanced rapidly for years and has consistently achieved economic growth, happiness has not risen within the nation since the 1970s. As with most countries with a significant gap between the rich and poor, just as Thailand, existing literature suggests happiness growth that the United States has attained been severely unequal. Research does note though that while happiness inequality is still high, happiness gaps across certain demographics have mended. For example, two-thirds of the African American and Caucasian gap have closed and it has also been argued the happiness gap between females and males has inverted in favor of women.
The Easterlin Paradox offers insight to economic effects on happiness in the United States. Easterlin debunked the finding that society’s average level of happiness increases as average income increases. As expressed in the discussion on happiness in Thailand, to a certain threshold, the point of survival, money matters. Beyond the benchmark, especially in financially healthy nations such as the United States, the happiness-income relationship is relative. Once one has more than enough money for survival, subjective well-being is affected relatively, or in other words, richer people are not always happier than people with less. This reflects findings in Thai studies brought forth above. The effects of income, as researched in the United States, are relative, and the social comparison especially upon finances has a consistent negative effect on happiness in the United States. This fact speaks to the United States’ consumerism tendencies to always crave more.
With what is known about income levels, consumption as a pathway to happiness has been tested as well. One study measured consumption factors to see if money can really buy happiness. The study found that consumption of durables, charity, personal care, food, health care, vehicles and housing were not significantly associated with happiness, and the only component with a positive relation to happiness was leisure consumption. Appeal to leisure can be assumed in different ways. On one hand, the leisure category can reflect status, and it can be implied from this study that happiness of Americans most greatly derives from status goods. On the other hand, understanding leisure as a means of social connectedness, the same methods of approaching happiness from a social networking standpoint used earlier can be adopted.
Economic Influence of Happiness in Thailand and The United States
Current research informs of the effects of varying indicators of happiness across the world, but what do economic influencers tell about countries from different regions of the world and different development levels? Comparing Thailand and the United States, commonalities exist among the influence of economic factors on happiness. Both countries regard income as relative, meaning, there is no one numerical benchmark for either country that says “if you make above this amount, you will be happy,” or, “if you make under this amount, you will be unhappy.” Both Thailand and United States compare to those around them to garner a basis for satisfaction or happiness.