Wealth Vs. Happiness: A New Look at an Age-Old Question

GEORGETOWN, Texas, Jan. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Which is more important:
wealth or happiness?

While America has traditionally measured its success by looking at
numbers such as the Gross Domestic Product (previously the Gross
National Product), a growing number of scholars are questioning
whether this is really the best way to assess how well off we are.

"Negative events that reduce well being actually increase GDP," says
A.J. Senchack, holder of the Lucy King Brown Chair in International
Business at Southwestern University in Georgetown, Texas.

Hurricane Katrina is a case in point. While this was a personal
disaster for hundreds of thousands of citizens, recent figures for the
country's GDP showed a robust growth of 4.1 percent due to the huge
medical expenses and rebuilding costs associated with the hurricane.
Many other transactions such as crime, divorce and environmental
degradation have a similar impact on GDP.

Senchack says that GDP -- which has its roots in the 1930s -- was
never intended to be a direct measure of economic health or
well-being. "Our policymakers, economists and the media bestowed that
role on it," he says.

Their rationale for doing so, he says, was logical: the more a nation
produces and consumes, the wealthier it is. This also means its
standard of living becomes higher. Hence, its citizens should be
better off or happier.

"But there is a disconnect here," Senchack says. "Being wealthier
simply does not translate into being happier. Many studies shows the
United States to be no happier than it was 50 years ago; we are no
happier than when we were poorer."

Researchers have recently created a new field of inquiry known as the
economics of happiness or well-being. The field is a multidisciplinary
one that draws on work in economics, neuroscience, psychology and
sociology.

Several of the leading researchers in the field will gather at
Southwestern University Feb. 9-10 for a symposium titled "GNP or Gross
National Well-Being?" It is the first conference in the United States
to be devoted entirely to this topic.

Speakers at the symposium include Ed Diener from the University of
Illinois, the leading authority on the psychology of well-being;
Rafael Di Tella, a macroeconomist from Harvard University; Read
Montague, a neuroscientist from Baylor College of Medicine; and Tim
Kasser, a psychologist from Knox College.

Senchack, who organized the symposium, says he hopes it will help lead
to alternative, national well-being measures that give a more
representative picture of how happy people are. An example of such an
index is the "Genuine Progress Indicator" created by the public policy
organization Redefining Progress. This index starts with GDP and then
adjusts for income distribution and leisure time, adds household and
volunteer work, and subtracts the costs of crime, family breakdown and
pollution.

He also hopes the symposium will encourage governmental policies that
take well-being into account, rather than solely focusing on economic
growth.

"We need to be as concerned about 'affluenza' as we are about
influenza," Senchack says.

Additional information on the symposium is available at
http://www.southwestern.edu/brownxxviii . The symposium is free and
open to the public.

This news release was issued on behalf of Newswise(TM). For more
information, visit http://www.newswise.com . SOURCE Southwestern
University