Beijing, May 15 (ANI): Chinese are less happy than they were two decades ago, despite an unprecedented rate of economic growth, according to a new research.
The new research is made by economist Richard Easterlin, one of the founders of the field of "happiness economics" and namesake of the Easterlin Paradox.
According to the research, in 1990, at the beginning of China's economic transformation, a large majority of Chinese people across age, education, income levels, and regions reported high levels of life satisfaction.
Sixty-eight percent of those in the wealthiest income bracket and 65 percent of those in the poorest income bracket reported high levels of satisfaction in 1990.
But life satisfaction has fallen dramatically among the poorest Chinese in the last two decades, reflecting a growing unease about employment prospects and the dissolution of the social safety net.
Only 42 percent of Chinese in the lowest income level reported high levels of life satisfaction in 2010, while, the percentage of the wealthiest Chinese who said they were satisfied with their lives grew about 3 percentage points, to 71 percent.
The paper, to appear around May 14 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveals that the Chinese Government has not released an official report about wealth distribution in the country in more than a decade.
"There are many who believe that well-being is increased by economic growth, and that the faster the growth, the happier people are. There could hardly be a better country than China to test these expectations," Easterlin, University Professor and Professor of Economics at the University of Southern California, said. (ANI)
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