We study quot;habituationquot; to income and to status using individual panel data on the happiness of 7,812 people … income and status and compare the long run effects. We can (cannot) reject the hypothesis of no adaptation to income (status …) during the four years following an income (status) change. In the short-run (current year) a one standard deviation increase …

corresponding correlation for income inequality. This remains so after allowing for bounded scale reporting, including a purely …

We test for whether, once "basic needs" are satisfied, there is happiness adaptation to further gains in income using … of European countries from 1975-2002, shows different patterns of adaptation to income across the rich and poor. We find … evidence that for wealthy Germans, and for the rich half of European nations, higher levels of per capita income don't buy …

of everyone else. According to the income comparisons model, this change in transparency can widen the gap in well … it increased the life satisfaction gap by 21%. We provide suggestive evidence that some, although probably not all, of … this effect relates to changes in self-perceptions of relative income. We provide back-of-the-envelope estimates of the …

This paper studies the links between income, sexual behavior and reported happiness. It uses recent data on a random …. Greater income does not buy more sex, nor more sexual partners. The typical American has sexual intercourse 2-3 times a month …

This paper presents a framework for the quantitative analysis of individual income dynamics, mobility and welfare, with … ex-ante identical individuals facing a stochastic income process and market incompleteness implying that they are unable … to insure against persistent shocks to income. We show how the parameters of the income process can be estimated using …

declines--on the order of 40%--in real incomes for both men and women. The brunt of the income decline appears to have been … decline. For most groups, a (conservative) correction for selection into income recipiency explains some, but not all, of the … income decline. For other groups, selection is a potential explanation for the income decline. Perhaps the most persuasive …

This paper presents new information on the fraction of adjusted gross income, and of wages and salaries, that is … reported by taxpayers in the top one half of one percent of the income distribution. This corresponds to roughly five hundred … thousand households in the late 1990s. This paper relies on data from the Treasury's Individual Income Tax Model for the period …

inequality and the growth of both income and population, once we control for the initial distribution of skills. What determines … one third of the variation in income inequality, and that skill inequality is itself explained by historical schooling …

international and intra-national differences in life satisfaction. Third, the very significant influences of both income and social …This paper uses the first three waves of the Gallup World Poll to investigate differences across countries, cultures … and regions in the factors linked to life satisfaction, paying special attention to the social context. Our principal …