Benefits of income: Associations with life satisfaction among earners and homemakers

Benefits of income: Associations with life satisfaction among earners and homemakers. JudithGere and Ulrich Schimmack. Personality and Individual Differences, Volume 119, 1 December 2017, Pages 92-95. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2017.07.004

Highlights
•    The study tested whether money increases happiness or happy workers earn more money.
•    Results indicated support only for the money-increases-happiness model.
•    Household income predicted life satisfaction regardless of people's earning status.
•    The moderating effect of earning status did not differ across nations.

Abstract: The question of how money and happiness are associated is still debated. This study tested two hypotheses that aim to explain this association: (1) money increases happiness, and (2) happy people make more money. Using data from the World Values Survey (N = 64,923, k = 81 nations), we tested whether earning status (primary vs. non-primary earner) moderates the association between income and happiness. The two theories make different predictions regarding this moderation effect: if money increases happiness, household income should predict happiness equally, regardless of earning status. If happy people earn more money, household income should predict the well-being of primary earners more strongly. Multilevel models indicated that data were consistent with the money-increases-happiness hypothesis: income predicted happiness equally for primary earners, secondary earners, and homemakers who do not contribute to household income directly.

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"gender also predicted life satisfaction such that primary-earner wives were more satisfied than homemaker husbands, an effect that did not differ across nations."