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The Quality of Life in England and Wales

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  • Sylaja Srinivasan
  • Geoff Stewart

Abstract

Local amenities play an important role in determining where we choose to live and our overall quality of life (QOL). In many cases, however, amenities do not have prices and will therefore be underprovided by the market. In this paper, we use individual and county level data for England and Wales to estimate implicit amenity prices and to calculate an index of QOL for each county. Among our findings is a large negative price on air pollution. The range in QOL across counties is estimated to be in excess of 2,000 pounds per year.

Suggested Citation

  • Sylaja Srinivasan & Geoff Stewart, 2004. "The Quality of Life in England and Wales," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 66(1), pages 1-22, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:obuest:v:66:y:2004:i:1:p:1-22
    DOI: 10.1046/j.0305-9049.2003.00081.x
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Thomas Murray & David Maddison & Katrin Rehdanz, 2013. "Do Geographical Variations In Climate Influence Life-Satisfaction?," Climate Change Economics (CCE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 4(01), pages 1-21.
    2. Emilio Colombo & Alessandra Michelangeli & Luca Stanca, 2014. "La Dolce Vita : Hedonic Estimates of Quality of Life in Italian Cities," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(8), pages 1404-1418, August.
    3. Don J. Webber & Michael Horswell, 2009. "Microeconomic foundations of geographical variations in labour productivity," Working Papers 0913, Department of Accounting, Economics and Finance, Bristol Business School, University of the West of England, Bristol.
    4. Shi, Tie & Zhu, Wenzhang & Fu, Shihe, 2021. "Quality of life in Chinese cities," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    5. Lee, J. & Stewart, G., 2009. "Implicit amenity prices and the location of retirees in England and Wales," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 914, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    6. Knight, S.J; Howley, P.;, 2017. "Can clean air make you happy? Examining the effect of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) on life satisfaction," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 17/08, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    7. Raul da Mota Silveira Neto, 2006. "Preferência Revelada E Arbitragem Espacial: Determinando Um Ranking De Qualidade De Vida Para As Regiões Metropolitanas Do Brasil," Anais do XXXIV Encontro Nacional de Economia [Proceedings of the 34th Brazilian Economics Meeting] 75, ANPEC - Associação Nacional dos Centros de Pós-Graduação em Economia [Brazilian Association of Graduate Programs in Economics].
    8. Moro, Mirko & Brereton, Finbarr & Ferreira, Susana & Clinch, J. Peter, 2008. "Ranking quality of life using subjective well-being data," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 448-460, April.
    9. Silveira Neto, Raul Mota & Menezes, Tatiane Almeida de, 2008. "Preferência Revelada e Arbitragem Espacial: Determinando um Ranking de Qualidade de Vida para as Regiões Metropolitanas do Brasil," Revista Brasileira de Economia - RBE, EPGE Brazilian School of Economics and Finance - FGV EPGE (Brazil), vol. 62(4), December.
    10. Leknes, Stefan, 2015. "The more the merrier? Evidence on quality of life and population size using historical mines," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 1-17.
    11. Lee, J. & Stewart, G., 2009. "Implicit amenity prices and the location of retirees in England and Wales," Discussion Paper Series In Economics And Econometrics 0914, Economics Division, School of Social Sciences, University of Southampton.
    12. Giuseppe Munda, 2015. "Beyond Gdp: An Overview Of Measurement Issues In Redefining ‘Wealth’," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(3), pages 403-422, July.
    13. Helena Meier & Katrin Rehdanz, 2017. "The amenity value of the British climate," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(5), pages 1235-1262, April.

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