Di Tella, R., &MacCulloch, R. (2008). Gross national happiness as an answer to the Easterlin Paradox?.Journal of Development Economics, 86(1), 22-42.
The Easterlin Paradox refers to the fact that happiness data are typically stationary in spite of considerable increases in income. This amounts to a rejection of the hypothesis that current income is the only argument in the utility function. We find that the happiness responses of around 350,000 people living in the OECD between 1975 and 1997 are positively correlated with the level of income, ...