Happy Happiness Report

I have enjoyed several hours over the last couple of days reading the 188 pages of the World Happiness Report, a UN and OECD sponsored attempt to analyse drivers and outcomes for life satisfaction globally. Here is a link to where you can download the report: http://worldhappiness.report/ed/2017/.

I love these things. I always enjoy digging into studies of deeper meaning than pure economic data, full of country comparisons and potential learning points for societies and for ourselves. I am amazed at how little attention these reports get. Surely they should be required reading for all politicians, and leaders should be held to account by journalists over the revelations and what can be done to improve things?

There are a few potential reasons for indifference. One is that these reports tend to be complex and nuanced, full of caveats and statistical explanations. Another is that the people politicians truly feel themselves accountable to, donors and corporations, have every reason to feel threatened by such reports. As individuals, maybe they are just too overwhelming for most to spend time on.

Whatever the cause, it is a crying shame. Such reports are jam packed with thought provoking ideas that can make a massive difference to the quality of life of every human. Furthermore, they usually offer joy from celebrating the wonderful advance of humanity over recent generations, an antidote to the constant doom and gloom we usually get to read.

As usual, The Economist highlighted the report in its excellent Espresso daily digest, though even they, usually so rigorous, demonstrated the point about complexity. Their headline was about how Rwanda had dramatically increased the life satisfaction of its citizens over the recent past. In fact, the report shows that Rwanda still sits in the bottom ten globally. Where it has advanced is in all the established drivers of satisfaction. According to the main model in the report, Rwanda should have made strides up the league table. But they haven’t – and that in itself is interesting. Why not?

That sort of thought is my curse with these reports, and I remember the same whenever I commissioned market research at work. The report always seems to be interesting, but then to beg more questions than it answers. That must be a double-edged weapon for market research professionals. Clients are always lured to the possibility of lucrative follow-up research, but then never seem to be satisfied with what they get.

This is especially true of this study, for good reason. The researchers have to pull together disconnected studies from all over the globe and at different times with different words, while trying to account for cultural factors. It is a miracle that they can reach as many solid conclusions as they can. But much of my reading drove my curiosity towards what more I could discover, rather than enjoying what I was just discovering.

As an example, one of the professed key drivers of life satisfaction is GDP at purchasing power parity. I can easily accept that it is a driver. But what related variables might also have an influence? Anticipated future GDP, inequality of GDP, rate of change of GDP, perceived risks to GDP, lagged GDP, how GDP is marketed – all could be powerful sub-drivers, and I’d love to know more about them. The same is true for all six key factors.

The study uses a single main question, called the Cantril ladder. People are asked how they would score their current life on a scale of zero to ten compared with the best possible life for them. It is an interesting question. I’m not sure happiness is a good word for its result; I think I’d prefer contentment or satisfaction.

The authors model factors to best explain the different scores between nations. They come up with six. GDP is one, and healthy life expectancy is another. The other four are more social. Respondents are asked if they have people they can turn to if in trouble, whether they think government and business are corrupt, and how free they feel about making life choices. Finally, they are asked if they have donated to a charitable cause recently.

Between them, these six factors explain about 75% of the differences between nations. The top ten countries are the usual suspects: the five Nordics including Iceland are joined by the Netherlands, Switzerland and the three white commonwealth countries of Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The bottom of the list is dominated by African nations – including Rwanda, despite what the six-factor model would predict. The USA came in at 14, the UK at 18. Once again I was able to feel blessed and a little smug about where I had been able to live myself and about where I have brought up my children.

There are fascinating chapters about China, Africa and the US, and one about satisfaction at work. I had not previously made the comparison between China and the Central European countries I used to visit in the 1990’s. Just like in China, these endured an abrupt liberalisation followed by an economic revival. Tellingly, life satisfaction has followed a U curve, and it cannot be said for sure that people are happier now than before the liberalisation started.

The US chapter is remarkably hard hitting, with little nuance or masking of the opinion of authors. Life satisfaction in the US has been following a steady downward path, and the recommended solutions are a focus on education for all, addressing inequality and rebuilding trust in society and institutions. Of course it is noted that this is the precise opposite of the path advocated by Donald Trump and by the Republicans. If life satisfaction declined under a progressive president, we can only fear its trajectory from now.

Another chapter digs a little into drivers of individual satisfaction within a society. This has few surprises, but is still interesting. Childhood experience matters, as does education, but employment and income, physical and mental health, and being with a partner count for more. Mental health seems to be especially important, offering a signal to give this a greater policy priority. In wealthy societies, relative income and education matters as much as absolute levels. As individuals, it is not easy to influence many of the factors in the short term, though it seems that a life able to balance many of these factors will usually bring more satisfaction.

The report also led me to think what I could do about my own life. I would score a 10 to the Cantril ladder question, so I wondered if the factors helped to explain why, since some years ago I would have scored lower. I have been blessed in all the individual drivers, but what about the national ones?

My personal GDP has declined precipitously, but what might be important is that I have come to feel that I have enough, and a path forward where that is unlikely to change. My healthy life expectancy must be diminishing with age, but I do take a bit better care of myself than I used to, physically and mentally, I feel better now, and the US practice of lots of tests has given me some reassurance about what illnesses I don’t currently suffer from.

It does annoy me to see such corruption and venality among those with power, but perhaps nowadays I can understand it better, deal with it better when it affects me, and also balance my view with how humanity is progressing. I am blessed with people who would help me in a crisis, and more generally feel surrounded by human goodness most of the time. I have learned to be honest with myself, be vulnerable, to give less offence, and to forgive – all from a low base line.

I have always felt a freedom to make life choices, and maybe this has even increased now I have chosen to step off the corporate ladder and now that the kids are getting closer to independence. Perhaps my biggest personal change has been in generosity, to friends and some strangers, and to special people that need help such as those where we volunteer.

So serendipity has led to possible improvements in all the factors, but it also points to things to hold on to and places to develop further. I recommend the report, all 188 pages of it. It will make you feel better about humanity, help you understand some policy dilemmas, and perhaps do something about your own life satisfaction score. Thank you UN and OECD and their donors. I’ll look out for next year’s issue.

Weasel Words

One of the most powerful tools of marketing is word association. If a brand can somehow become associated with something seen as universally desirable, at least within a target group, then that brand has a marketing edge.

Examples can be BMW and its relentless efforts to associate itself with luxury, or De Beers and all its campaigns to link diamonds with undying love. Recently, the word organic has become marketing karma. I have no idea what organic really means, especially in the US, where I trust regulations as far as I could throw a fat cat CEO or lobbyist. For almost every category now, I can make a choice claimed as organic. The only thing I have deduced is that the label makes it more expensive. So in my mind, when I see organic I think overpriced, and choose an alternative, except where I have learned that a specific organic product really tastes better.

In these days of reduced attention spans and dubious reporting, one of the ways to dupe people is via weasel words. The same techniques perfected by marketers have been taken over by lobbyists and politicians and anyone else trying to influence our opinions or actions. We would do well to become aware of this, to find ways to spot a weasel word, and even to counter weasel campaigning.

Some parts of the state have used weasel words for years, after propaganda became more sophisticated during world war two and then the cold war. And, without becoming too much of a conspiracy theorist, we should be somewhat suspicious of most things.

I have written before that I fear The Economist, so trustworthy on most things, has some sort of relationship with MI5, and that periodically articles sneak in on Russia that are little more than state propaganda. There was an essay on Iran a couple of weeks ago that fit the pattern. The conclusion was that the Iran should be heavily sanctioned and potentially limited militarily. The justifications were a lot of vague claims about sponsoring terrorism and the like. I could have replaced the word Iran with Saudi Arabia or even Israel and come up with similar conclusions very easily.

Such propaganda is all about weasel words. When one side attacks they are terrorists, while the other are either rebels, or internationally recognized coalitions. Mosul is being liberated, somehow heroically, but Aleppo was raped. I am no apologist for ISIL/ISIS/Daesh, but complexities are routinely glossed over. Reporting on Yemen is an insult to our intelligence, yet somehow most of us fall for it.

More recently, that same weasel word tactic developed military wing of the state has been copied by those peddling domestic political agendas. They have often done it brilliantly.

An early assault was on tax. Tax is an easy target because none of us like to pay taxes. So around the time of Reagan and the great wrong turning, a weasel assault started on all tax. Progressives became tax and spend liberals. Central government committed federal overreach, compromising liberty. Spending programs became wasteful subsidies, driving up debt. Welfare always went to scroungers, looking for entitlements, and usually cheating. Tax was an unjust penalty against hard work. An estate tax became a death tax.

It has been relentless, and brilliant. The reality is that tax finances education, health care, the military and police, infrastructure, pensions and an employment safety net. A hundred years ago education could only be bought privately, so only the wealthy got any. The same was true of the other items on the list, but then we became civilised, and had to find a way to finance it. Since 1945, it was accepted that those with higher incomes and wealth should pay more in than they took out, to support those who could not afford their share.

This all fell apart around 1980, and all taxes have reduced since, with progressive taxes reducing the most. The result is a starving of investment and development and surge in inequality. Yet the weasel word has been so effective that the US last year elected a president on a campaign to double down on the mistake.

Like with all weasel words, there is a kernel of logic. A chronically overtaxed society will grow more slowly, uncontrolled spending leads to debt, and governments can spend inefficiently. But policy since 1980 has swung way beyond any required correction for these things.

Now there is a new assault, with the next weasel word being regulation. Like tax, regulation has a benevolent purpose, to protect the citizen and consumer from abuse. Without regulation, many markets break down and the strong exploit the weak. Again, over-regulation causes harm, inhibits competition and protects incumbents, so there is a kernel of logic. But the lobbyists have taken this and created a new weasel word. We see the early results in the US – firms can pollute streams and emit methane again, while bribing foreign governments, while consumers can no longer be sure their financial advisor is acting in their interest. Weasel words do damage.

A good weasel word in education is choice. Who could be against choice? As parents, we want to be able to choose the best options for our kids. But what does choice mean in practice? Unless very carefully regulated (whoops, another weasel word), the result is wealthy parents siphoning kids into privileged schools while funding for the rest is reduced. It could take us back a hundred years. And a bi- product is abuse of teachers, though – here is the kernel of logic – some correction of teacher union power would be beneficial.

So watch out for weasel words. Another is non-profit. We think of non-profits as altruistic and service-orientated. In health care it is usually just a device to avoid tax while building a brand image. Jobs could be the ultimate weasel word. Who could be against jobs? Well, the reality is that jobs is a weasel word used by lobbyists for big companies when they want power via labour flexibility (another weasel word). Another wonderful weasel word is freedom – how can such a free society have so many prisoners?

What is the antidote? Well, at a personal level, there are some defences against weasel words. One is scepticism. Another trick is to mentally play outrageous opposites or word substitution; that is to try to imagine the effect of the opposite of a statement – replacing Iran with Israel is an example.

But most of the antidotes require hard work. Build a store of weasel words and challenge any statement including them. Read more widely and with greater diversity, and seek out those with opposite opinions. Challenge your own assumptions.

As advocates, we can’t beat them, so sometimes we have to join them. It is astonishing how some groups lose their arguments in long-winded detail. The Remain and Clinton campaigns are example. Simplicity is powerful – even if sometimes slightly disingenuous.

At societal level it is more difficult, since most trends favour weasel words. Low attention spans, the power of money and polarised reporting all make them more prevalent. And these trends can be self-reinforcing, for example with deregulation. In the very long term, stronger education will enable more people to see through the tricks, but that will take several generations. And in the meantime, we are all vulnerable.

Wednesday at the Park

On Wednesday I had one of my tourist days. If the weather looks well set on a Wednesday, I’ll often go into the city and pick up a cheap Broadway matinee ticket. Then I’ll enjoy people watching over a coffee in Times Square, and meet my wife for lunch before the show. Afterwards I’ll walk again, to central park if there is time, and have a cup of tea before evensong at St. Thomas Fifth Avenue, where the singing of my favourite type of music is second to none. After that I’ll walk uptown for my own early music choir rehearsal.

This sort of day makes me feel blessed to be free and in New York City. I did the same thing the day after the election as a sort of tonic. Wherever you live, there will be great places to visit that will make you feel better, so find some time to take advantage. Residents usually don’t do enough tourism around their own neighbourhoods.

The matinee yesterday was the Sondheim musical Sunday in the Park with George. I had never seen a live production of that show before, and I loved it. It was an honest production that did not try to do too much. Both lead actors have lovely but tough singing parts, and I would score each of them about seven out of ten, plenty good enough not to spoil the show. The music is some of Sondheim’s best, and culminates in the beautiful number Sunday that closes both acts and had me in tears.

But the strength of the show is the story, which is so much more thought provoking than most of the inane musicals on offer. It centres on the creation by Georges Seurat of the painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte. The characters come from the painting, with stories created in its Parisian park and Seurat’s studio, including of a girlfriend Seurat gets pregnant and then abandons. The second act takes us forward a hundred years, linked by that same baby, now ninety-eight, sharing the stage with another George, the great grandson of Seurat, also trying to make his way as an artist, but in Chicago.

I loved the way that Sondheim set songs from Lapine’s book to make points about art as well as love and human nature, and somewhat deeper points than the ones we usually are bombarded with in musicals.

Seurat’s mum has a sweet duet with her son about nostalgia. She is a rather bitter old woman, always complaining about how things were better in the past, and the song acknowledges nostalgia but reminds us that we would generally be better served finding awe at the world of the present.

Then there are songs about dedicating a life to work and about perfectionism, the balance between doing an established thing better and better and trying something new. Again, Sondheim acknowledges the dilemma, and explores it through the fictional character of Seurat’s great grandson. In the end, an artist must be prepared to move on, to take a risk, to push the boundaries, for that is how true progress comes about.

Then there is a lovely message about legacy. The ninety-eight year-old woman makes the interesting claim that the only things that we leave behind are our children and our art. This feels like a simplification to me, but still something worthy of thought.

The claim ignores any potential we have to change the world by our actions or relationships, when plainly everything we do has that potential. But perhaps we can allow that most such actions are so ephemeral that their impact on humanity can be discounted. Then we have to expand the concept of art to include scientific discovery, and also politics, sport and even warfare. Then indeed the claim has merit. Think of everyone from two hundred or more years ago that you have heard of, and why. It will be via their art – with its expanded definition. And plainly we live on through our offspring.

The context of the claim is the old lady encouraging her grandson to be as courageous and creative as he can with his art, and at the same time to reconcile the differences with his ex-partner so that they can produce a child. The same context plays out (in the musical) for Georges Seurat himself, who becomes so lost in his art that he even walks away from his unborn child, and eventually from his own life at thirty-one by failing to take adequate care of his health. In his case, original art truly is everything, and we only have to look at his magnificent work to feel gratitude for that.

All of these dilemmas feel real to Sondheim in his score, and one more perhaps even more so. A song from a scene in Chicago shows the young artist buffeted by all sorts of challenges beyond the range of his artistic talent. He has to bow the whims of his sponsor, faun to his patrons, procure materials and manage a team, and handle critics. In the end the quality of the art itself can appear incidental, its impact depending on so many outside factors.

That has always been the life of the artist. If Palestrina had not secured his job at the Sistine Chapel and if the Church hierarchy at Leipzig had obtained their wish to be rid of J.S. Bach, we would probably not have any access to their works today. Indeed, if Seurat had not had the benefit of wealthy parents and a tolerant sponsor he might have vanished into obscurity, and perhaps much of impressionism with it. An artistic legacy can be quite a lottery.

I have experienced this with musicians, and always advise people that music is generally far better as a hobby than as a career. Most professional musicians become worn down by the poor pay, the dependence on people you don’t respect, the bitching and the relentless competition. Sad to relate, in many, many cases it even causes them to lose their passion for music itself. Those of us with music for a hobby can simply enjoy our passion.

The legacy lottery is still there, but it has changed. Like so many specialities, in the past it was the preserve of white men of noble birth or other familial advantage. Gesualdo was a count, and even compositions of Henry the eighth have survived. What a loss to humanity it is that for much of our existence, the artistic potential of almost all of us was doomed to be unfulfilled. I suppose the old lady in Sunday would just encourage us to have more babies!

But in one generation the lottery has changed. Last Sunday my chamber choir performed two exquisite motets by contemporary composers. One of these, Zander Fick, was a lad of twenty-five, who works in Pretoria as a financial advisor.

So now anyone can compose, anyone can record and anyone can become famous. In visual arts it is even more extreme – all we need is a smart phone and a single photograph can secure our legacy.

So we have gone from a grossly restricted supply to an almost unlimited supply of art. But good art is still in the eye of the beholder, and a legacy will only belong to those who can win the marketing game, nowadays often as not controlled by Google or Facebook, and influenced more than ever by extraneous factors like sex appeal.

Still, we can surely celebrate that art has opened up to humanity now. I was certainly grateful to Zander Fick last Sunday, and even more grateful to Stephen Sondheim on Wednesday. Art is good.