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Income comparison, collectivism and life satisfaction in Turkey

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Abstract

The current research examines the impact of income comparisons on life satisfaction in Turkey which has a feature of “collectivism” or “low individualism”. This is done by analyzing the results of the “Life Satisfaction Survey” applied by the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK) for 2011. Using ordered logit estimations, this paper reveals that most of the income comparison, interaction variables and socio-economic variables have a significant explanatory power on life satisfaction levels in Turkey. The main emphasis of the paper is that reference group’s self-reported life satisfaction is related to income comparisons, along with other socioeconomic factors. The impact of comparisons is asymmetric, in that in most cases, under-performing one’s benchmark had a greater effect than out-performing it.

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Notes

  1. For a detailed information on economics and happiness, see: Frey and Stutzer (2002).

  2. Detailed information on happiness in nations can be found at World Database of Happiness. See: Veenhoven (2014).

  3. http://www.geert-hofstede.com/turkey.html.

  4. For a detailed survey about life satisfaction and transition countries see: Selezneva (2011) and Clark and Senik (2010).

  5. For health related happiness studies in Turkey please see: Subaşı and Hayran (2005), Sener et al. (2007), İnal et al. (2007), Bodur et al. (2006), Deniz (2006), Öngen (2009), Çivitçi and Çivitçi (2009).

  6. http://www.worlddatabaseofhappiness.eur.nl/hap_nat/nat_fp.php?cntry=39&name=Turkey&mode=3&subjects=55&publics=6.

  7. The model was also estimated using Huber/White-heteroscedasticity-consistent standard errors for all sample and for all categories.

  8. At the time of writing, 1 Turkish Lira was equal to 0.47 US Dollars and 0.34 Euro.

  9. The model without comparison variables and interactions effects is not shown in the paper, but is available upon request.

  10. Clark and Senik (2010), Senik (2004, 2008, 2009), Dumludag (2014), Mayraz et al. (2009), Van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell (2004), Luttmer (2005).

  11. In different levels of development, impact of evaluations may differ. For instance downward evaluations work rather than upward ones in developed European countries. At a high level of development upward evaluations may not lead to an increase in life satisfaction since material aspirations are already high (or increased) as well. See Easterlin (1995), Layard (2005).

  12. Clark and Senik (2010), Senik (2004, 2008, 2009), Dumludag (2014), Mayraz et al. (2009), Van Praag and Ferrer-i-Carbonell (2004), Luttmer (2005).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics, Marmara University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Devrim Dumludag & Selay Giray

  2. Department of Economics (AE1), Maastricht University, Maastricht, Netherlands

    Devrim Dumludag & Ozge Gokdemir

  3. Department of Economics, Istanbul University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Ozge Gokdemir

Authors
  1. Devrim Dumludag
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  2. Ozge Gokdemir
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  3. Selay Giray
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Correspondence to Devrim Dumludag.

Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 11 and 12.

Table 11 Descriptive statistics
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Table 12 Cross-tabulation of education and happiness
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Dumludag, D., Gokdemir, O. & Giray, S. Income comparison, collectivism and life satisfaction in Turkey. Qual Quant 50, 955–980 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11135-015-0185-1

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