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Income, Health and Happiness

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  • Peter Saunders

Abstract

This article utilises unit record data from the 1989–90 National Health Survey to explore the relationships between low income and perceptions of health and happiness. After describing how the key variables were constructed, attention is focused on the incidence of perceived poor health and unhappiness among those individuals living in income units on either side of a poverty threshold related to the Henderson poverty line. The results reveal that those in poverty generally have poorer health and are less happy than those above the poverty threshold. The observed differences are statistically significant for many income unit types, particularly non‐aged single people and couples with children. Attention then turns to exploring how health and happiness vary across the deciles of the income distribution. Again, significant differences are revealed, particularly when more sophisticated distributional measures are employed. Finally, consideration is given to the possibility that the results reflect reverse causality, and that the observed correlations incorporate the role of intervening variables.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Saunders, 1996. "Income, Health and Happiness," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 29(4), pages 353-366, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ausecr:v:29:y:1996:i:4:p:353-366
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8462.1996.tb00941.x
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    Cited by:

    1. Victoria Ateca-Amestoy & Mariana Gerstenblüth & Irene Mussio & Máximo Rossi, 2014. "How do Cultural Activities Influence Happiness? The Relation Between Self-Reported Well-Being and Leisure," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 0614, Department of Economics - dECON.
    2. Manoj K Pandey, 2009. "Labor Force Participation among Indian Elderly: Does Health Matter?," Working Papers id:1987, eSocialSciences.
    3. Crossley, Thomas F. & Kennedy, Steven, 2002. "The reliability of self-assessed health status," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(4), pages 643-658, July.
    4. Gerdtham, Ulf-G & Johannesson, Magnus, 2001. "The relationship between happiness, health, and socio-economic factors: results based on Swedish microdata," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 30(6), pages 553-557.
    5. Manoj K. Pandey, 2009. "Poverty and Disability among Indian Elderly: Evidence from Household Survey," ASARC Working Papers 2009-10, The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre.
    6. Pandey, Manoj K., 2009. "On ageing, health and poverty in rural India," MPRA Paper 15932, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Daina McDonald, 2006. "150 Issues of The Australian Economic Review: The Changing Face of a Journal over Time," Melbourne Institute Working Paper Series wp2006n01, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, The University of Melbourne.
    8. Meng-Wen Tsou & Jin-Tan Liu, 2001. "Happiness and Domain Satisfaction in Taiwan," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 2(3), pages 269-288, September.
    9. Pandey, Manoj K., 2009. "Labor force participation among Indian elderly: does health matter?," MPRA Paper 15394, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Thomas F. Crossley & Steven Kennedy, 2000. "The Stability of Self Assessed Health Status," CEPR Discussion Papers 421, Centre for Economic Policy Research, Research School of Economics, Australian National University.
    11. Manoj K. Pandey, 2013. "Elderly's Health Shocks and Household's Ex-ante Poverty in India," ASARC Working Papers 2013-01, The Australian National University, Australia South Asia Research Centre.

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