The relationships between income, life satisfaction and emotional well-being in European countries differing in wealth

Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate whether income has different relationships to subjective well-being in richer countries compared to poorer ones. We report analyses based on interview data collected in the European Social Survey (n = 72,574) that examine how income relates to life satisfaction (LS) and emotional well-being (EWB) in 28 European countries, varying in gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. Our results indicate that the within-country correlations of income with LS and EWB decrease as GDP per capita increases. Partial correlations controlling for EWB are positive but do not vary with GDP per capita, whereas partial correlations controlling for LS vary inversely with GDP per capita. We hypothesise that the invariant income-LS relationships result from effects of relative income on social comparisons, while the varying income-EWB relationships result from the negative impacts of time scarcity in richer countries and the buffering of negative experiences in poorer ones.