Inequality-Adjusted happiness (IAH)

Abstract

According to the utilitarian creed, the quality of a society should be judged using the degree of happiness of its members, the best society being the one that provides the greatest happiness for the greatest number. Following the egalitarian principle, the quality of a society should be judged by the disparity in happiness among citizens, a society being better if differences in happiness are smaller. Performance on these standards can be measured using cross-national surveys, where degree of happiness is measured using the mean response to a question about happiness and disparity is expressed as the standard deviation of responses. These measures are married together in an index called the “inequality-adjusted happiness” (IAH) that gives equal weight to either criterion. It is a linear combination of the mean happiness value and the standard deviation in a nation, and it is expressed as a number on a 0-100 scale.