Los religiosos son más felices en América Latina

Abstract

For several years, classical economic theory said that high levels of purchasing power determine increases in the happiness of individuals. However, in 1974, following the research proposed by Easterlin, who found that happiness levels are not always accompanied by high income levels, numerous empirical and theoretical studies were triggered, in order to determine what are the non-monetary factors, which have a greater impact on the reported happiness of individuals. The objective of this research is to analyze the effect of religiosity and various sociodemographic characteristics on the levels of happiness reported by the inhabitants that make up the Latin American region. For this, through the use of the World Values Survey (WVS), 2010-2014 period, four probit models were estimated. The results suggest that the impact of religion on the happiness of Latin Americans is minimal, because individuals pay more attention to factors such as: family importance, health status and financial satisfaction.