The Joneses in Japan: Income Comparisons and Financial Satisfaction

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in EconStor may AbstractThis paper uses Japanese data which includes measures of self-declared satisfaction, reference-group income, and the direction and intensity of income comparisons.Relative to Europeans, the Japanese compare more to friends and less to colleagues, and compare their incomes more. The relationship between satisfaction and others' income is negative, and more negative for those who report greater income comparison intensity.A self-reported measure of others' income does better than cell-mean income in explaining satisfaction, and would arguably make a useful addition to many existing surveys.

Direct Evidence on Income Comparisons and Subjective Well-Being

“…4 Clark/Senik (2010) report a similar distribution of a general measure of income comparison intensity based on data from 18 European countries. This also holds for Mayraz et al (2010), who use the SOEP pretest module 2008 only, and for the sample of respondents from Japan employed by Clark et al (2013). 5 Similar numbers are documented by Mayraz et al (2010) for the 2008 pretest.…”

“…In addition, respondents can state the most important reference category (family, neighbour, friend, colleague or others) and are asked to provide information about the perceived income of "people of the same age, sex, and education level". Clark/Senik (2010) and Clark et al (2013) are, thus, partially able to tackle the first and second problem mentioned in the previous paragraph. However, due to the data at hand they still face the problem that their respondents might choose the preferred reference group endogenously.…”

“…whose income respondents are most likely to compare their own income with. Similarly, Clark et al (2013) relate an indicator of comparison intensity ("How much are you concerned, anxious or envious about other people's income?") for respondents of an internet survey from Japan to financial satisfaction.…”

Positional Income Concerns: Prevalence and Relationship with Personality and Economic Preferences

“…The repercussions of positional income concerns for subjective well-being, which are at the heart of Senik (2009) and most other papers on relative income (see the survey by Clark et al 2008), are not of interest to us in the present paper. Instead, our research focuses on the association of positional income concerns, personality, and economic preferences, a nexus not yet explored in the previous literature (including Clark and Senik 2010, Clark et al 2013, Dahlin et al 2014, and Senik 2009. The remainder of the paper is structured as follows.…”

Envy in the process of development: Implications for Social Relations and Conflict

“…European countries: Clark and Senik (2010). The intensity of social comparisons is estimated to be even higher in Japan (Clark, et al, 2013). Relative standing and subjective wellbeing : Clark, et al (2008).…”