Exploring geographies of happiness in Britain and the implications for public policy Dimitris Ballas Social And Spatial Inequalities (SASI) Department of Geography University of Sheffield

Outline What is happiness? Happiness, inequality and social comparisons Policy-relevant research questions Geographies of happiness and well-being in Britain Happy People or Happy Places? Data sources and concluding comments

What is happiness? Greece, circa 500 BC Socrates, Plato  Aristotle ( BC) Nichomachean Ethics (350 BC) England, 18 th century Jeremy Bentham (1748 – 1832), the principle of Utility John Stuart Mill (1806 – 1873) – Utilitarianism

What is happiness? Can it be measured? Human perceptions of happiness vary and depend on a wide range of factors What is the good life for man? The question of what is a full and rich life cannot be answered for an individual in abstraction from the society in which he lives (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics) Can happiness be measured? Happiness is subjective and no objective theory about the ordinary concept of happiness has the slightest plausibility (Sumner, 1996)

What is happiness? Can it be measured? A person who has had a life of misfortune, with very little opportunities, and rather little hope, may be more easily reconciled to deprivations than others reared in more fortunate and affluent circumstances. The metric of happiness may, therefore, distort the extent of deprivation in a specific and biased way. (Sen, 1987: 45, my emphasis) Oswald and Clark ( ): statistical regression models of happiness measuring the impact of different life events upon human well being

Can happiness be measured? Positive and negative feelings are inversely correlated Happiness can be thought of as a single variable (Layard, 2005; Frey and Stutzer, 2002)

General happiness Self Completion (4) Question Number and Text KS1L : Have you recently....been feeling reasonably happy, all things considered? Value Label % More so than usual Same as usual Less so than usual Much less than usual 42.2 Source: The British Household Panel Survey, 1991

General Health Questionnaire (1) Have you recently: Been able to concentrate on whatever you are doing? Lost much sleep over worry? Felt that you are playing a useful part in things? Felt capable of making decisions about things? Felt constantly under strain? Felt you could not overcome your difficulties?

General Health Questionnaire (2) Have you recently: Been able to enjoy your normal day-to-day activities? Been able to face up to your problems? Been feeling unhappy or depressed? Been losing confidence in yourself? Been thinking of yourself as a worthless person? Been feeling reasonable happy all things considered?

Happiness in different activities (after Layard, 2005)

Social Justice, inequality and happiness “A house may be large or small; as long as the surrounding houses are equally small it satisfies all social demands for a dwelling. But if a palace arises beside the little house, the little house shrinks to a hovel… [and]… the dweller will feel more and more uncomfortable, dissatisfied and cramped within its four walls.” (Marx, 1847)

Happiness and inequality “When we are at home, most of us like to live in roughly the same style as our friends or neighbours, or better. If our friends start giving more elaborate parties, we feel we should do the same. Likewise if they have bigger houses or bigger cars.” (Layard, 2005: 43)

Happiness and inequality “… similarly at work, I compare my income with what my colleagues get, in so far as I hear about it. If they get a raise above inflation and I get inflation only, I get mad.” (Layard, 2005: 44)

Happiness and inequality “Napoleon envied Caesar, Ceasar envied Alexander, and Alexander, I daresay, envied Hercules, who never existed. You cannot, therefore, get away from envy by means of success alone, for there will always be in history or legend some person even more successful than you are.” (Bertrand Russell, 1930: pp , cf Frey and Stutzer, 2002: 86)

Happiness, geography and inequalities “… the broad impression is that social class stratification establishes itself primarily as a national social structure, though there are perhaps also some more local civic hierarchies – for instance within cities and US states. But it should go without saying that classes are defined in relation to each other: one is higher because the other is lower, and vice versa. The lower class identity of people in a poor neighbourhood is inevitably defined in relation to a hierarchy which includes a knowledge of the existence of superior classes who may live in other areas some distance away.” (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2006: 7, my emphasis)

Links between income inequality and well-being (Wilkinson and Picket, 2006) The proportion of analyses classified as wholly supportive falls from 83% (of all wholly supportive or unsupportive) in the international studies to 73% in the large sub-national areas, to 45% among the smallest spatial units. The spatial scale at which people make their social comparisons is more likely to be the nation state (arguably reflecting socio-economic position) than it is to locality (reflecting position within neighbourhood).

Happiness and inequality “…while economic goods and services are obviously important, many people believe that inequality also affects human welfare in ways that are independent of any given household’s purchasing power. Even if my family income remains constant, the distribution of income in my neighbourhood or my nation may influence my children’s educational opportunities, my life expectancy, my chance of being robbed, the probability I will vote and perhaps even my overall happiness.” (Jencks, 2002: 57)

Geographies of happiness in Britain Source: The British Household Panel Survey, 2001

Spatial distribution of “unhappiness”

REGION BY SOCIAL CLASSCLASS 1CLASS 2CLASS 3CLASSES 1 - 3N Rest of Yorks & Humberside Tyne & Wear East Midlands Inner London Rest of North West South West Greater Manchester West Midlands Conurbation East Anglia Merseyside West Yorkshire Rest of South East ,875 Outer London Rest of West Midlands Rest of North Wales South Yorkshire Great Britain ,264 Geographies of unhappiness in England and Wales

Policy-relevant research questions: What are the factors and life events that influence different types of individuals’ happiness and how might these affect the overall structure and cohesion of society? Is the source of happiness or unhappiness purely personal or do issues underlying inequalities in the distribution of income, wealth, skills, capability and power matter? If comparisons regarding income and wealth inequalities are important, what is the spatial scale at which people make their social comparisons? Happy People or Happy Places?

World  Nation  Region  City  Electoral Wards  Output Area  Neighbourhood  Household  Individual Methods: –Regression models –Multi-level modelling approaches –Microsimulation and Spatial Microsimulation

Secondary data sources 1991 & 2001 Census of UK population: 100% coverage fine geographical detail small area data available only in tabular format with limited variables to preserve confidentiality British Household Panel Survey: sample size: more than 5,000 households annual surveys since 1991 individual data more variables than census coarse geography household attrition

Life-event data analysis (Ballas and Dorling, 2006) BHPS: What has happened to you (or your family) which has stood out as important? 145,408 major life events recorded between

Source: Barclays, 2005

Geographical Inequalities of Income and Wealth: what people want and need “By necessities, I understand not only the commodities which are indispensably necessary for the support of life, but whatever the customs of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lower order, to be without. A creditable day labourer would be ashamed to appear in public without a linen shirt.” (Smith, 1759: 383)

City Name Top Price 2003 Lowest Price 2003 Price ratio 1993 Price ratio 2003 London Manchester Preston Reading Bolton Blackburn Birmingham Middlesbrough Nottingham Leicester Bristol Leeds (Source: SOC project, Pritchard, Thomas, Dorling and Ballas,

York Brighton Grimsby Hastings Milton Keynes Wakefield Stoke Cambridge Mansfield Swindon Huddersfield Barnsley Burnley Telford (Source: SOC project, Pritchard, Thomas, Dorling and Ballas, 2005)

Building geographical simulation models of happiness for “what-if” public policy analysis Source:

Concluding comments Happiness and Major Life events Happiness and value systems Adding a geographical dimension to explore the geography of well-being, based on the estimated database through the 1990s and early 2000s Maps of well-being can be produced for different types of people (i.e. by age, SEG etc) Income and wealth inequalities and happiness (what does money buy you in different places?) A strong case is being made that there is a relationship between geographical and socio- economic inequalities and well-being that needs to be examined in more detail Increasing polarisation and widening of inequalities in Britain – local socio-economic polarisation