RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Ron Haskins, August 19, 2011, The Brookings Institution
Ron Haskins looks at the plight of Roma people and questions why this large minority population has not made great progress within Bulgaria since the fall of the Communist government or Bulgaria's entry into the EU. Haskins recommends development in areas like education and leadership training as he argues that progress depends on the actions of enlightened individuals and groups in their own spheres of influence. Read More
BOOK
Carol Graham, June 21, 2011
In this straightforward and accessible book, Carol Graham explores what we know about the determinants of happiness across and within countries of different development levels, including some counterintuitive and surprising relationships. She then raises the challenges posed by the use of these measures as comparative indicators. Foremost among these are the extent to which people can adapt to adversity and still report to be happy (the "happy peasant and frustrated achiever" problem) and the need for clarity on the definition of happiness. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Carol Graham, December 15, 2010, The Brookings Institution
In a recent post to The New York Times Freakonomics blog, Justin Wolfers and Daniel Sacks show a statistically significant relationship between economic growth and life satisfaction in a large sample of countries from around the world, and thereby assert that the Easterlin paradox is debunked. However, Carol Graham suggests that the debate over the paradox is more nuanced and depends on the questions that are used, the sample of countries, and the period of time used in empirical tests. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Justin Wolfers and Daniel Sacks, December 13, 2010, The New York Times Freakonomics blog
Justin Wolfers discusses his research showing that economic development is associated with rising life satisfaction. Wolfers critically examines recent research seeking to debunk his work on this topic. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Carol Graham, Soumya Chattopadhyay, James Coan, Kenneth Medlock III and Amy Myers Jaffe, September 2010, The Brookings Institution
With about 250 million motor vehicles in the United States in 2008, gasoline purchases continue to be an essential part of the American way of life. By the summer of 2008, gasoline prices had reached a national average of $4.11 per gallon. Carol Graham and Soumya Chattopadhyay research the unpredictable fuel costs and state that the fluctuating costs make planning monthly household expenditures difficult, which can be detrimental to individual welfare and even to the overall economy. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Carol Graham, July 2010, United Nations Development Programme
The introduction of the Human Development Index sparked a major debate about the adequacy of income as a measure of development. As a result, scholars have developed a number of novel measures of well-being. In a new Human Development Working Paper from the United Nations Development Programme, Carol Graham discusses how happiness surveys can contribute to our understanding and measurement of empowerment as well as the promises and potential pitfalls of directly applying the findings to policy challenges, which are germane to measuring and comparing empowerment across countries. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Daniel W. Sacks, Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers , October 01, 2010, The World Bank, Working Paper
Justin Wolfers, Daniel Sacks and Betsey Stevenson explore the relationships between subjective well-being and income, as seen across individuals within a given country, between countries in a given year, and as a country grows through time. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
William A. Galston, July 02, 2010, The New Republic
William Galston looks into how the Great Recession has affected America, based on a recent report by the Pew Research Center. Galston highlights some of the less-noticed details in the report, which suggest that the Great Recession will have a more-than-transitory effect on the outlook and psychology of most Americans, with significant consequences for the U.S. economy and society. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Carol Graham, April 21, 2010, The Brookings Institution
On April 21, Carol Graham took your questions in a live web chat to explore how measures of happiness may be more novel barometers for well-being than more easily defined variables such as income or wealth. Seung Min Kim, assistant editor at POLITICO, moderated the discussion. Read More
PAST EVENT
Thursday, April 15, 2010
3:30 PM to 5:00 PM
Washington, DC
Social scientists, pollsters and the media are increasingly asking if Americans feel happy, secure and hopeful about the future—or if instead they feel burdened by bad economic news. On April 15, Brookings hosted a discussion focusing on happiness in the United States and around the world. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Gregg Easterbrook, June 16, 2008, NPR's Talk of the Nation
Americans are bombarded by negative images of life nationally and around the world. But are things really as bad as they seem? Gregg Easterbrook argues that, "even if a recession has begun, occasional cycles of slow or no growth are the price we pay for the much longer cycles of boom" — and that we really are better off than what we're being told to believe. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Gregg Easterbrook, June 13, 2008, The Wall Street Journal
Most Americans perceive the nation in a pessimistic state. With the economy in turmoil, gas prices rising dramatically, and the housing market down, Americans are negatively viewing the current state of the nation. However, Gregg Easterbrook argues that we should feel good about our standing and that America is in a better state than before. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Clifford Winston, June 09, 2008, washingtonpost.com
Clifford Winston joins Shankar Vedantam of the Washington Post to discuss human behavior and worker burnout on washingtonpost.com Department of Human Behavior online chat. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Gregg Easterbrook and Elizabeth Warren, January 11, 2008, American Public Media, Marketplace
Brookings Expert Gregg Easterbrook and Harvard Law School's Elizabeth Warren discuss the squeeze on the American middle class. Read More
RESEARCH AND COMMENTARY
Carol Graham, H. Peyton Young and Ross A. Hammond, August 21, 2007, The Washington Post
A growing body of economic research is showing that social norms and influence play a significant role in the spread of obesity. Carol Graham, Ross Hammond and Peyton Young write that more research is needed to determine exactly how social norms matter, and to serve as a basis for effective policy interventions. Read More