The Equality Trust and Happiness: Background information when reading The Spirit Level

The Equality Trust and Happiness

This article relates to The Spirit Level

Authors Wilkinson and Pickett work to enact the ideas they put forward in The Spirit Level on their Equality Trust website and its campaign for economic equality. Visit this site for blog entries and updates on their work.

Watch a video of Wilkinson and Pickett talking about the ideas in The Spirit Level:

If money doesn't buy happiness, as Wilkinson and Pickett suggest, then what is happiness and how or where do we find it?

If you'd like to seek happiness, Forbes has an article on the happiest places on earth:

"Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands rated at the top of the list, ranking first, second and third, respectively. Outside Europe, New Zealand and Canada landed at Nos. 8 and 6, respectively. The U.S. did not crack the top 10. Switzerland placed seventh and Belgium placed tenth." Forbes cites family, social connection, national economic health, and employment rates as prime determinants of happiness - supporting in some ways the thesis of Wilkinson and Pickett.

Joshua Wolf Shenk's article in The Atlantic, "What Makes Us Happy," investigates George Vaillant's longitudinal study of happiness at Harvard through case-studies.

In 2011, Somerville, Massachusetts became the first city in the USA to track happiness when it added the question, "How happy do you feel right now?" to the city's census forms.

Filed under Cultural Curiosities

This "beyond the book article" relates to The Spirit Level. It originally ran in February 2010 and has been updated for the April 2011 paperback edition. Go to magazine.