Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption

The recent literature has shown that subjective welfare depends on relative income. Much of the existing evidence comes from developed economies. What remains unclear is whether this is a universal human trait or an artifact of a prosperous, market-oriented lifestyle. Using data from Nepal, a mounta...

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Main Authors:	Fafchamps, Marcel, Shilpi, Forhad
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	EN
Published:	2012
Subjects:	Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis D120 Welfare Economics: General D600 Welfare and Poverty: General I300 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development O120 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5706

id	okr-10986-5706
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-57062021-04-23T14:02:23Z Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption Fafchamps, Marcel Shilpi, Forhad Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis D120 Welfare Economics: General D600 Welfare and Poverty: General I300 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development O120 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 The recent literature has shown that subjective welfare depends on relative income. Much of the existing evidence comes from developed economies. What remains unclear is whether this is a universal human trait or an artifact of a prosperous, market-oriented lifestyle. Using data from Nepal, a mountainous country where many households still live in relative isolation, we test whether poorer and more isolated households care less about relative consumption. We find that they do not. We investigate possible reasons for this. We reject that it is due to parental concerns regarding the marriage prospects of their children. But we find evidence in support of the reference point hypothesis put forth by psychologists: household heads having migrated out of their birth district still judge the adequacy of their consumption in comparison with households in their district of origin. 2012-03-30T07:34:08Z 2012-03-30T07:34:08Z 2008 Journal Article Journal of Development Economics 03043878 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5706 EN http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo World Bank Journal Article
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	EN
topic	Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis D120 Welfare Economics: General D600 Welfare and Poverty: General I300 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development O120 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150
spellingShingle	Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis D120 Welfare Economics: General D600 Welfare and Poverty: General I300 Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development O120 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Fafchamps, Marcel Shilpi, Forhad Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
relation	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo
description	The recent literature has shown that subjective welfare depends on relative income. Much of the existing evidence comes from developed economies. What remains unclear is whether this is a universal human trait or an artifact of a prosperous, market-oriented lifestyle. Using data from Nepal, a mountainous country where many households still live in relative isolation, we test whether poorer and more isolated households care less about relative consumption. We find that they do not. We investigate possible reasons for this. We reject that it is due to parental concerns regarding the marriage prospects of their children. But we find evidence in support of the reference point hypothesis put forth by psychologists: household heads having migrated out of their birth district still judge the adequacy of their consumption in comparison with households in their district of origin.
format	Journal Article
author	Fafchamps, Marcel Shilpi, Forhad
author_facet	Fafchamps, Marcel Shilpi, Forhad
author_sort	Fafchamps, Marcel
title	Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
title_short	Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
title_full	Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
title_fullStr	Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
title_full_unstemmed	Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption
title_sort	subjective welfare, isolation, and relative consumption
publishDate	2012
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5706
_version_	1764396027793637376

Subjective Welfare, Isolation, and Relative Consumption

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