Abstract
This paper compares the life satisfaction and working hours of Latin Americans and U.S. Americans using the AmericasBarometer and General Social Survey. While there are many common determinants of happiness, hours worked is not among them. Differences in cultural values, especially the distinction between collectivism (familism) and individualism that has long been a foundation of social development theory, may be why married Latin American males are less happy than married U.S. American males when working longer hours. The distinction is not apparent among females or the unmarried.
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Notes
Most studies use the term “happiness” interchangeably with the term “subjective well-being.” For a detailed review of these definitions see Easterlin (2003).
Appendix 1 contains the Hofstede individualism ratings for the United States, Australia, United Kingdom, and Latin American countries.
Working hours is a choice variable. Thus, it is important to acknowledge that it might be affected by unobservable factors such as personality traits that also are important determinants of subjective well-being.
For a detailed overview of the ordinal regression model using a latent variable see Long and Freese (2006). OLS results are included in Appendix 4 for comparison, as several recent studies have shown ordered logit and OLS to be comparable (Ferrer-i Carbonell and Frijters 2004; Van Praag and Ferrer-i Carbonell 2004).
The LAPOP Survey for the United States lacked the working hours question, thus the use of the GSS instead. Also, these years were selected so that Latin Americans and U.S. Americans were surveyed at approximately the same time.
Due to inherent limitations of the survey wording, we also use life satisfaction and happiness interchangeably as they are highly correlated.
Marriage and religious affiliation are important sources of social capital. Social capital refers to the social networks within a community, including bonding among individuals through social ties and relationships. It provides individuals with a “sense of belonging.” C.f. Fukuyama (1999), Putnam (2001).
Myers (2000) also argues that four inner traits mark happy people: high self-esteem, a sense of personal control, optimism, and extroversion. These trait-happiness correlations are not yet fully understood and findings inherently suffer from causality problems. Some traits may predispose to happiness, while happiness might also be a contributing cause, but they point to a rationale for culture-specific sources of happiness. Each is greatest when achievements are consistent with the social paradigm.
Some studies also include friendship given that close relationships with friends contribute to life satisfaction, providing people with a supportive network (Myers 2000). Unfortunately, the LAPOP dataset did not contain questions on friendship.
Marriage seems to provide protection against depression and mental ill-health which can impact life satisfaction (Cochrane 1996).
An interesting question is whether the determinants of happiness in Latin America will change as Catholicism weakens its influence (Paulson 2014).
One study, examining Weber’s theory of Protestantism and capitalism, suggests that Protestantism was associated with economic affluence not because of any difference in work ethic, but rather because it furthered the creation of social capital by ensuing literacy (Becker and Woessmann 2007). Rather than relying on injunctions set by the Catholic Church, Luther favored universal schooling and believed people needed to be literate to be able to read the Bible for themselves, in their own language. Thus, Protestants acquired more schooling than Catholics and as a side effect schooling transformed into economic prosperity.
Given that the dataset is a cross-sectional survey based on subjective assessments, selection bias and unobserved variable bias can be potential limitations to the analysis. Different controls were used in separate models and the relationship is robust: in all models Latin Americans are less happy than U.S. Americans when working longer hours.
Research involving Latin American countries is scarce and still a fairly new endeavor. Graham and Pettinato (2001) were the first to analyze happiness in that region. None of the few other Latin American studies considers the working hours-happiness relationship (Ateca-Amestoy et al. 2014; Graham and Felton 2006; Lora 2008; Rojas 2006)
The relationship is not necessarily causal for two main reasons: data is cross-sectional, and it is not entirely clear what the direction of causality is. In this case, however, it seems more reasonable to conclude that working less makes Latin Americans happier than U.S. Americans, as opposed to the alternative explanation that happier Latin Americans work less than U.S. Americans.
When taking into account several dimensions of happiness combined, typically studies have found that Scandinavian countries are the happiest (Helliwell et al. 2012)
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Acknowledgments
We would like to thank the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) and its major supporters (the United States Agency for International Development, the United Nations Development Program, the Inter-American Development Bank, and Vanderbilt University) for making the data available. We would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable insights and comments.
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Appendices
Appendix 1: Sample Details
See Tables 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12 and Fig. 5.
Working hours in the United States and Latin America. a U.S. Americans, b Latin Americans
Appendix 2: Latin American Countries
Country | Freq. | Per. | Val. Per. | Cum. Per. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Mexico | 1559 | 4.21 | 5.49 | 5.49 |
Guatemala | 1538 | 4.16 | 5.41 | 10.90 |
El Salvador | 1549 | 4.19 | 5.45 | 16.35 |
Honduras | 1522 | 4.11 | 5.36 | 21.71 |
Nicaragua | 1540 | 4.16 | 5.42 | 27.13 |
Costa Rica | 1500 | 4.05 | 5.28 | 32.40 |
Panama | 1536 | 4.15 | 5.41 | 37.81 |
Ecuador | 3000 | 8.11 | 10.56 | 48.37 |
Bolivia | 2990 | 8.08 | 10.52 | 58.89 |
Peru | 1500 | 4.05 | 5.28 | 64.17 |
Paraguay | 1166 | 3.15 | 4.10 | 68.27 |
Chile | 1527 | 4.13 | 5.37 | 73.65 |
Uruguay | 1500 | 4.05 | 5.28 | 78.92 |
Brazil | 1496 | 4.04 | 5.26 | 84.19 |
Venezuela | 1500 | 4.05 | 5.28 | 89.47 |
Argentina | 1486 | 4.02 | 5.23 | 94.70 |
Dominic Republic | 1507 | 4.07 | 5.30 | 100.00 |
Total | 28,416 | 76.81 | 100.00 | |
Missing | 8577 | 23.19 | ||
Total | 36,993 | 100.00 |
Appendix 3: American Regions
Region | Freq. | Per. | Val. Per. | Cum. Per. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
New England | 320 | 0.86 | 3.73 | 3.73 |
Middle Atlantic | 1084 | 2.93 | 12.64 | 16.37 |
E. Nor. Central | 1468 | 3.97 | 17.12 | 33.48 |
W. Nor. central | 513 | 1.39 | 5.98 | 39.47 |
South Atlantic | 1892 | 5.11 | 22.06 | 61.53 |
E. Sou. Central | 482 | 1.30 | 5.62 | 67.14 |
W. Sou. Central | 908 | 2.45 | 10.59 | 77.73 |
Mountain | 662 | 1.79 | 7.72 | 85.45 |
Pacific | 1248 | 3.37 | 14.55 | 100.00 |
Total | 8577 | 23.19 | 100.00 | |
Missing . | 28,416 | 76.81 | ||
Total | 36,993 | 100.00 |
Appendix 4: OLS Regressions of Happiness
Variable | W1 | W2 | W3 | W4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Working hours cat * Latin | −0.024*** | |||
(0.007) | ||||
Working hours cat | 0.018** | |||
(0.006) | ||||
Latin | 0.434*** | 0.423*** | 0.370*** | 0.319*** |
(0.050) | (0.053) | (0.042) | (0.042) | |
Income | 0.043*** | 0.043*** | 0.043*** | 0.043*** |
(0.004) | (0.004) | (0.004) | (0.004) | |
Nonwhite | −0.027* | −0.028* | −0.026* | −0.028* |
(0.013) | (0.013) | (0.013) | (0.013) | |
Married | 0.129*** | 0.128*** | 0.128*** | 0.128*** |
(0.012) | (0.012) | (0.012) | (0.012) | |
Age | −0.014*** | −0.014*** | −0.014*** | −0.014*** |
(0.002) | (0.002) | (0.002) | (0.002) | |
Age2 | 0.000*** | 0.000*** | 0.000*** | 0.000*** |
(0.000) | (0.000) | (0.000) | (0.000) | |
Female | 0.001 | 0.001 | 0.002 | −0.000 |
(0.011) | (0.011) | (0.011) | (0.011) | |
Education | 0.010*** | 0.010*** | 0.010*** | 0.010*** |
(0.001) | (0.001) | (0.001) | (0.001) | |
Attend religious service | 0.040*** | 0.040*** | 0.040*** | 0.040*** |
(0.004) | (0.004) | (0.004) | (0.004) | |
Working hours * Latin | −0.002** | |||
(0.001) | ||||
Working hours | 0.002* | |||
(0.001) | ||||
More than 40 h * Latin | −0.082*** | |||
(0.024) | ||||
More than 40 h | 0.065** | |||
(0.020) | ||||
Less than 40 h * Latin | 0.056* | |||
(0.027) | ||||
Less than 40 h | −0.043 | |||
(0.023) | ||||
_cons | 1.813*** | 1.817*** | 1.858*** | 1.896*** |
(0.062) | (0.064) | (0.059) | (0.060) | |
N | 15,891 | 15,891 | 15,891 | 15,891 |
R-sq | 0.083 | 0.082 | 0.083 | 0.082 |
Appendix 5: Robustness Tests—Additional OLR of Happiness
See Tables 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25 and 26.
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Valente, R.R., Berry, B.J.L. Working Hours and Life Satisfaction: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Latin America and the United States. J Happiness Stud 17, 1173–1204 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-015-9637-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-015-9637-5