Happiness, Space and Place: Community Area Clustering and Spillovers of Life Satisfaction in Canada

This article analyses such effects at a much smaller geographical unit: community areas. These are small area level geographies at the intra-urban level. In particular, the article presents a spatial econometric approach to the analysis of life satisfaction data aggregated to 1,215 communities in Canada and examines spatial clustering and spatial spillovers. Communities are suitable given that they form a small geographical reference point for households. We find that communities ’ life satisfaction is spatially clustered while regression results show that it is associated to the life satisfaction of neighbouring communities as well as to the latter's average household income and unemployment rate. We consider the role of shared cultural traits and institutions that may ex plain such spillovers of life satisfaction. The findings highlight the importance of neighbouring characteristics when discussing policies to improve the well-being of a (small area) place.
Source: Applied Research in Quality of Life - Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research