Mismeasurement or misspecification? Integrating well-being theories to improve empirical precision

Crawford School of Public Policy | Arndt-Corden Department of Economics

Event details

PhD Seminar (Econ)

Date & time

Friday 11 November 2016
9.30am–11.00am

Venue

Seminar Room 3, Level 1, JG Crawford Building 132, Lennox Crossing, ANU

Speaker

Mark Fabian, PhD scholar, Crawford School, ANU.

There has recently been an attempt to approach wellbeing using empirical techniques and limited theory. This has yielded an enormous body of literature. This paper will argue that much of this literature is of dubious merit, especially the literature in happiness economics, because the instruments used to measure happiness are invalid. These measurement issues are being compounded by the lack of a unified theoretical model of well-being shared across the relevant disciplines. The paper sketches such an integrated model of well-being. It incorporates hedonic and eudemonic dimensions, drawing on philosophical, psychological and economic literature.

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