Handbook on the Economics of Happiness

This book is a welcome consolidation and extension of the recent expanding debates on happiness and economics. Happiness and economics, as a new field for research, is now of pivotal interest particularly to welfare economists and psychologists. This Handbook provides an unprecedented forum for discussion of the economic issues relating to happiness. It reviews the more recent literature and offers the interested reader an insight into the vast scope of the field in terms of the theory, its applications and also experimental design. The Handbook also gives substantial indications as to the future direction of research in the field, with particular regard to policy applications and developing an economics of interpersonal relations which includes reciprocity and social interaction theory.Reflecting the contribution of a major research activity on the study of happiness, economics and interpersonal relations, this book will be of great interest to economists and psychologists in general, as well as welfare economists and postgraduate scholars of cooperation, welfare, social planning, non-profit, corporate social responsibility and related fields.

'Whether you're looking for economic realities expressed through mathematical formulae, classical history, Immanuel Kant's ethics, or sustainable development, there's something here for you. . . I suggest that you read it.', 'After many years of neglect, the topic of happiness is returning to the agenda of economics. This wide-ranging collection of papers considers the significance of happiness for economic theory and policy, drawing on ideas from psychology, philosophy and history as well as economics itself. In stressing the importance of sociality as a source of happiness, the authors open up new territory for social science.'

Edited by Luigino Bruni, Professor of Political Economy, Department of Law, Economics, Politics and Modern languages, LUMSA University and the late Pier Luigi Porta, formerly Professor of Economics, University Milano-Bicocca, Italy