International Centre for Health & Society, UCL 2003
2003 Seminar Series

Monday 1 December 5.00pm
(followed by drinks at 6pm)

Richard Layard
Director of the Programme on Well-Being
London School of Economics

'Happiness and Public Policy'

Despite economic growth, longer holidays and better health, happiness has stagnated in Britain over the last 50 years. The main reason has been excessive focus on incentives for individual wealth creation and inadequate focus on the practical ways in which misery can be reduced
and happiness increased. Policy implications include the following.

I. Since much income generation is aimed at improving relative income (a zero-sum game), taxation is less inefficient than is usually supposed.

II. Far more resources should go on treating mental illness, and on related research.

III. There is no need to increase mobility, which increases crime and damages families.

IV. Excessive individualism generates anxiety and should be replaced by a new commitment to the common good (ie the greatest happiness of all).

V. Social science research should be refocused towards explaining happiness and what we can do to affect it.

Richard Layard is Director of the Programme on Well-Being at the LSE. In March he delivered the Robbins Lectures on the subject "Happiness: Has Social Science a Clue?", and is now writing a book on the subject. He has written widely on unemployment, inflation, education, inequality and post-Communist reform. His work inspired the Labour Government's New Deal for the unemployed. Since 2000 he has been a member of the House of Lords.



E-mail: ichs@public-health.ucl.ac.uk
RSVP seminar attendance by 28/11/03
(indicating any special needs and for directions to the seminar room)
Ms Patricia Crowley
International Centre for Health and Society
Dept of Epidemiology & Public Health, UCL
1 - 19 Torrington Place, London WC1E 6BT
T: (International code +44 20) or (Domestic code 020) 76791708
F: (International code +44 20) or (Domestic code 020) 7813 0280
W: www.ucl.ac.uk/epidemiology