Title: Marriage, Money and Happiness
1Marriage, Money and Happiness
- By Ted Goertzel
- Rutgers University, Camden NJ
- Spring, 2004
2My Research Questions
- Are married people happier than single people?
- Does this relationship hold up if I control for
age and income?
3(No Transcript)
4Data Source
- The data are from the 1998 General Social Survey
of the United States Population - N 2832
5Dependent Variable
- HAPPY? Taken all together, how would you say
things are these days? Would you say that you
are very happy, pretty happy or not too happy?
6Independent Variables
- MARITAL Are you currently married, divorced,
separated or have you never been married? - INCOME In which of these groups did your total
family income from all sources fall last year,
before taxes that is? - less than 22,500
- 22,500 to 49,999
- 50,000 plus
- OVER50 Respondents Age is Under or Over 50
7Percent Very Happy
Married Divorced or Widowed Never Married
43.5 23.2 18.3
8Marital Status and Happiness
- For the sample as a whole, married people are
significantly happier than those who are widowed
or divorced or who never married. - This relationship is statistically significant at
the .000 level by chi-square test. - However, divorced and widowed people are likely
to be older than average, and this might effect
their happiness.
9Percent Very Happyfor respondents under 50
years old
Married Divorced or Widowed Never Married
41.7 19.5 19.9
10Marital Status and Happiness for those under 50
years of age
- The results for those under 50 are very similar
to those for the sample as a whole. - Marriage seems to lead to happiness for younger
people - But perhaps this is due to income. Married
people have a larger family income which may make
them happier
11Percent Very Happy
Income under 22,500 Income 22,500 to 49,999 Income over 50,000
22.2 29.7 42.0
12Money and Happiness
- The data show that people with a family income
above 50,000 are significantly happier - The causal relationships are ambiguous
- Marriage may have led to both a higher income and
happiness. - But does marriage add happiness even for those
with a higher income?
13Marriage and Happinessfor people with a family
incomeabove 50,000 a year
Married Divorced or Widowed Never Married
47.6 30 22.2
14Conclusion
- Even among those with a high income, married
people are much happier - This suggests that marriage brings both a higher
family income and happiness - The relationship between income and happiness may
be spurious