Let’s work together to create a happier world
The Happier Lives Institute connects donors, researchers, and policymakers with the most cost-effective opportunities to increase global wellbeing.
Using the latest subjective wellbeing data, we identify the problems that matter most to people and find evidence-based ways to solve them.
The Happier Lives Institute connects donors, researchers, and policymakers with the most cost-effective opportunities to increase global wellbeing.
Using the latest subjective wellbeing data, we identify the problems that matter most to people and find evidence-based ways to solve them.
Measuring what matters
Most people agree that happiness matters.
You might think it is the only thing that matters.
Over the last 30 years, pioneering academics in economics, philosophy, and psychology have tested and developed reliable measures of happiness and life satisfaction.
Today, large population surveys allow us to measure and track wellbeing across the world. We can stop relying on measures of wealth or health as our best guess for how people’s lives are going.
But what is wellbeing and how can we measure it?
You can make a difference
The cost-effective interventions we’ve identified may surprise you.
Our research shows that treating depression in low-income countries is four times more cost-effective than providing direct cash transfers.
Our latest news and research
Policies for wellbeing: A brief scoping review
In this report, summer research fellow Thomas Beuchot briefly scoped out the public policies that promise to be most effective at increasing wellbeing. The policies found as the most promising according to the grading criteria are mostly policies that are also widely valued and pursued outside of a wellbeing lens: unemployment, strong relationships, increased access to nature, and opportunities to volunteer. Read more
Can I get a little less life satisfaction, please?
We are pleased to share a new joint working paper between HLI and the Wellbeing Research Centre, Oxford University. In it, Dr Michael Plant explores the challenges of the nature and plausibility of the life satisfaction theory (LST) of wellbeing. Read more
HLI’s Giving Season 2023 Research Overview
In this report, we provide an overview of all our evaluations to date as well as our conclusions for Giving Season 2023. Read more
