Taylor & Francis Hirata, J: Happiness, Ethics and Economics

Modern happiness research has produced a wealth of evidence on the relationship between economic conditions and life satisfaction. This relationship is rather complex and it is to some extent intuitive but also partly surprising This book provides a stringent interpretation of this evidence and shows that it can be understood with the help of a handful of psychological and economic effects. To make sense of this evidence, it is necessary to have a sound conception of happiness that recognizes the ethical dimension of the concept, and Hirata does this by presenting happiness as a hedonic experience and evaluative exercise arguing that happiness is an important indicator that helps identify life concerns that really matter to people but that good development in society cannot be reduced to a matter of maximizing happiness.