Stefano Bartolini
Sociability Predicts Happiness over Time: Evidence from Macro and Micro Data
Paper invitato al 3rd OECD World Forum on Statistics, Knowledge and Policy: Charting Progress, Building Visions, Improving Life, 27-30 Ottobre, Busan, Corea del Sud
Abstract
In recent years, animated interdisciplinary discussion has been fuelled by the evidence that, in the long-term, people’s subjective well-being is not significantly influenced by increases in their income. Other factors, as the quality of intimate and social relationships that individuals experience, have a greater influence on their well-being. I summarize the evidence, from micro and macro data in several developed and developing countries, showing that the evolution over time of sociability is a major predictor of the trends of subjective well-being.
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Stefano Bartolini, Ennio Bilancini, Francesco Sarracino
Social Capital Predicts Happiness: World-Wide Evidence from Time Series
Abstract
This paper provides macro evidence that in the long run the trends of social capital are a strong predictor of the trends of subjective well-being. The applied measure of social capital is the membership of individuals in groups or associations. All countries for which there exist comparable long time series on social capital are considered, for a total of 14 developed and 5 developing countries. Correlations are calculated using the same bivariate analysis used by Easterlin and Angelescu (2009) to investigate the long run relationship between subjective well-being and GDP growth. Finally, several robustness checks of Easterlin and Angelescu’s results are performed, confirming that subjective well-being and GDP growth are unrelated in the long term.
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Stefano Bartolini
Buying alone: The Making of the American Consumer as the Prologue to the Current Economic Crisis
Presentato alla Conferenza Internazionale “From GDP to Well-Being, Economics on the Road to Sustainability” , Università Politecnica delle Marche, 3-5 Dic. 2009
Abstract
Most explanations of the current crisis focus on the financial markets. They stress i) the abundance of the credit supply in the US due to capitals inflows coming from abroad which determined a credit bubble and financed a consumption boom and ii) the lack of transparency of the default risk implicit in structured assets derived from the securization of mortgages and loans. These explanations overlook the credit demand which was driven by consumption demand. Why did the American consumers live for 15 years beyond their possibilities? Mortgages and credit cards were the way Americans bought bigger and nicer houses, and more consumption goods, than those that they could have afforded. What have driven Americans to accumulate an enormous debt, in order to finance their consumption, which was already the most affluent of the world? The explanation of the American consumerism proposed here is based on the decline of relational goods in the last thirty years. Some growth models show that individuals react to the decline of their relational goods by increasing their private (defensive) expenditures. Agents search in increasing private affluence for a compensation to declining relational conditions. Empirical evidence is provided for this explanation which is complementary to those based on financial markets conditions.
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Pubblicazioni su riviste con referaggio
“Money, Trust and Happiness in Transition Countries: Evidence from Time Series” (con M. Mikucka and F. Sarracino), Social Indicators Research, 130, pp. 87–106, gennaio 2017
“Do People Care About Future Generations? Derived Preferences from Happiness Data” (con F. Sarracino), Ecological Economics, 143, pp. 253–275, 2016
“Twenty-five years of materialism: do the US and Europe diverge?” (con F. Sarracino), Social Indicators Research, DOI: 10.1007/s11205-016-1381-7, 2016
“The dark side of Chinese growth: declining social capital and well-being in times of economic boom” (con F. Sarracino), World Development, 74, pp. 333–351, 2015
“ Building sustainability through greater happiness”, The Economic and Labor Relations Review, Symposium on Development, Equity and the Environment, 25, pp. 587-602, 2014
“Happy for How Long? How Social Capital and GDP relate to Happiness over Time”, (con F. Sarracino), Ecological Economics, 108, pp. 242–256, 2014.
“Great recession and U.S. consumers’ bulimia: deep causes and possible ways out”, (con L. Bonatti e F. Sarracino), Cambridge Journal of Economics, 38, pp. 1015–1042, 2014
“Predicting the trend of well-being in Germany: How much do comparisons, adaptation and sociability matter?” (con E. Bilancini e F. Sarracino), Social Indicators Research, 114 (3), pp. 169-191, 2013
“Did the Decline in Social Connections Depress Americans’ Happiness?”, (con E. Bilancini e M. Pugno), Social Indicators Research, 110, (3) pp. 1033-1059, 2013
“If not only GDP, what else? Using relational goods to predict the trends of subjective well- being”, (con E. Bilancini), International Review of Economics, 57 (2), pp. 199–213, 2010
“Endogenous growth, decline in social capital and expansion of market activities”, (con L. Bonatti), Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 67 (3), pp. 917-926, 2008
“The role of social capital in enhancing factor productivity: does its erosion depress per-capita GDP?” (con L. Bonatti), Journal of Socio-Economics, 37 (4), p.1539-1553, Aug 2008
“The mobilization of human resources as an effect of the depletion of environmental and social assets”, (con L. Bonatti), Metroeconomica, 57, pp.193-213, 2006
“Negative externalities, defensive expenditures and labor supply in an evolutionary context” (con A. Antoci), Environment and Development Economics, 9, pp. 591-612, 2004
“Endogenous growth and negative externalities”, (con L. Bonatti), Journal of Economics, 79, pp. 123-144, 2003
“Undesirable growth in a model with capital accumulation and environmental assets”, (con L. Bonatti), Environment and Development Economics, 8, pp. 11-30, 2003
“Environmental and social degradation as the engine of economic growth”, (con L. Bonatti), Ecological Economics, 41, pp. 1-16, 2002
Monografie
“Manifesto for Happiness. Shifting society from money to well-being”, in corso di pubblicazione nel 2018 presso Palgrave-McMillan.
Il libro è stato già pubblicato in italiano da Donzelli nel 2010 e da Feltrinelli nel 2013. Pubblicato in francese (editore Les liens qui libèrent, 2013), in albanese (editore Botine Perpjekja 2014) ed in corso di pubblicazione in giapponese (editore Commons Publishing Inc.). La prima parte del libro è stata pubblicata in spagnolo nel volume collettaneo Politicas Y Bienestar Sujetivo (a cura di D. Gómez-Álvarez e V. Ortiz Ortega, 2016).
Articoli su volumi collettanei
“Introduction” (con Ennio Bilancini, Luigino Bruni e Pierluigi Porta), in Stefano Bartolini, Ennio Bilancini, Luigino Bruni e Pier Luigi Porta (curatori), “Policies for Happiness”, Oxford University Press, 2016
“Social Capital Predicts Happiness Over Time: World-Wide Evidence from Time Series”, (con Ennio Bilancini, e Francesco Sarracino, ), in Stefano Bartolini, Ennio Bilancini, Luigino Bruni e Pier Luigi Porta (curatori), “Policies for Happiness”, Oxford University Press, 2016
“Buying alone: how the decreasing American happiness turned into the current economic crisis”, in Timo J. Hämäläinen and Juliet Michaelson (curatori), “Well-Being and Beyond: Broadening the Public and Policy Discourse”, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 144-181, 2014
“Comprare da soli. Come l’infelicità degli americani si è trasformata nella crisi economica attuale”, in Pettini A. e Ventura A. (curatori), “Quale crescita. La teoria economica alla prova della crisi”, Asino D’Oro, Roma, pp. 3-56, 2014.
“Are stressful jobs the price to pay for economic prosperity”,(con F. Sarracino) in F. Sarracino, (curatori), The happiness compass: theories, actions and perspectives for well-being, capitolo 9, Nova Science Publishers, 2013
“Che tipo di animale siamo?” in E. Basile, G. Lunghini e F. Volpi (curatori), Pensare il Capitalismo, Franco Angeli, Milano, pp. 51-60, 2013
“Social Assets, Technical Progress and Long-Run Welfare”, (con L. Bonatti) in L. Sacconi and G. Degli Antoni (curatori), “Social Capital, Corporate Social Responsibility, Economic Behavior and Performance”, Palgrave Mc Millan, Chippenham and Eastbourne, pp. 307-330, 2010
Competing Explanations of the Broken Promises of Economic Growth”, in L. Bruni and Porta P. L. (curatori), “Handbook on the Economics of Happiness”, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, pp. 337-364, 2007
“Beyond Accumulation and Technical Progress: Negative Externalities as an Engine of Economic Growth”, in Basili M., Franzini M., Vercelli S. (curatori), “Environment, Inequality and Collective Action”, Routledge, London and New York, 2006
“Una spiegazione della fretta e della infelicità contemporanee”, in Bruni L., Porta P. L. (curatori), “Felicità ed economia”, Guerini e Associati, Milano, pp 217-235, 2004
“Economia e felicità: una proposta di accordo” (con R. Palma), in L. Bruni e V. Pelligra (curatori), “Economia come impegno civile”, Città Nuova, Roma, pp.121-158, 2002
“Dinamiche di concentrazione della proprietà a S: Croce sull’Arno”, in M. Bellandi e M. Russo (curatori), “Distretti industriali e cambiamento economico locale”, Torino: Rosenberg e Sellier, pp.201-212, 1994
Volumi curati
“Policies for Happiness” (con Ennio Bilancini, Luigino Bruni e Pier Luigi Porta, edd.), Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2016
Enciclopedie
Autore della voce “Relational Goods”, in: Michalos AC (Ed.). Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research. Springer, Dordrecht, pp. 5428-5429, 2014
Working papers non ancora pubblicati
“Social Participation and Hours Worked” (con E. Bilancini), Quaderni del Dipartimento di Economia Politica e Statistica, Università di Siena, n. 620, 2011
Rapporti
“Scenari per la depurazione idrica nella ‘Terza Italia’: una analisi multicriterio del caso di Prato”, rapporto per programma europeo “Human capital and mobility”, Trento, 1997.
“Combustibili rinnovabili da sistemi agricoli integrati nello scenario energetico dell’Uruguay” (con E. Cresta ed E. Tiezzi), presented at the International Conference on Energy Options and the Rural Area, Bologna 1988.