It seems that happiness is busting out all over – like that famous lyric from the classic Broadway musical, Oklahoma. True, happiness is not much in evidence in our economy, or in our shrill and rancorous politics. But never mind. An explosion of research and a bumper crop of writings about happiness can be found -- somewhat incongruously -- in various academic journals these days, as well as in the bookstalls. A dozen titles were counted in a local bookstore recently without breaking a sweat.
Happiness we are told by these latter day Pollyannas is really our most important goal in life, not money. Accordingly, there is a growing, multi-disciplinary happiness movement in academia that aspires ultimately to replace our traditional focus on economic growth with something like a “Gross National Happiness” index (an idea pioneered many years ago, improbable as it may seem, in the tiny kingdom of Bhutan in Central Asia).
Among the many counter-intuitive – even astonishing – conclusions of this nascent new happiness science are some that are sure to make conservatives happy and raise the hackles of liberals. For example, most Americans are quite happy we are told, regardless of their economic and political circumstances, including more than 80 percent of the poor in some study results. Although average happiness levels are higher for the rich, their advantage is not as great as you might expect, and the growing income inequality between the rich and the poor in this country over the past 30 years has not made the poor any less happy, so it is claimed.
From Seattle
Should We Have a
“Gross National Happiness” Index?
by Peter Corning