An Assessment of Life Satisfaction Responses on Recent Statistics Canada Surveys

Measures of subjective well-being are increasingly prominent in international policy discussions about how best to measure "societal progress" and the well-being of national populations. This has implications for national statistical offices, as calls have been made for them to include measures of subjective well-being in their household surveys (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development 2013). Statistics Canada has included measures of subjective well-being - particularly life satisfaction - in its surveys for twenty-five years, although the wording of these questions and the response categories have evolved over time. Statistics Canada's General Social Survey (GSS) and Canadian Community Health Survey (CCHS) offer a valuable opportunity to examine the stability of life satisfaction responses and their correlates from year to year using a consistent analytical framework.