Subjective measures of well-being - based on questions like "Taking things all together, how would you say things are these days: would you say you're very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy these days?" - are motivated in large part by widespread dissatisfaction with traditional economic...

The rise of subjective measures of well-being represents at least two important trends in the measurement of welfare or well-being. The first trend, which has already received some attention in the literature, is a shift away from preference-satisfaction accounts of individual well-being and...