Does Money Make You Happy?

In the Panorama segmentation system, the most affluent segments are assigned to the lowest numbers with 01 One Percenters holding the top spot for affluence. Does money translate into happiness, or at least a better quality of life? To answer that question, we tabulated the census blocks by segment against both the quality of life and disease risk/incidence databases. While the most affluent segments scored the highest on the overall indexes, the details reveal some surprising insights.

The table below lists the highest and lowest ranked segments for each of the main quality of life components:

While 01 One Percenters scores the highest on overall quality of life, it does not score highest on any one of the five main indexes. In fact, 03 Second City Achievers ranks highest on both economic and community amenities.

Perhaps surprisingly, 66 Better Times Past ranks the lowest on overall quality of life despite being the ranked the highest in terms of access to leisure activities. Residents of these neighborhoods may be near a stunning variety of cultural and leisure attractions but often don’t have the financial means to partake of them. On the flip side, we all know that the suburbs aren’t exactly exciting places to live if you are looking for leisure activities, culture, and restaurants – 21 New Suburban Style has the dubious distinction of being the least attractive for things to do.

There is no perfect place to live, and often the choice of neighborhood reflects a complex trade-off between favorable and unfavorable components. We find that some segments score very high on one or more components, but very low on others.

The more affluent segments generally have the best access to health care services, but have higher taxation and cost of living, and because they tend to be urban this comes along with higher crime risk and air pollution. The segments with the most natural beauty are often remote and have low access to employment opportunities and health care.

For those who want to explore the results, you can download an Excel workbook that shows you a broad range of interesting data for each Panorama segment, including the quality of life indexes.

Does a higher quality of life score in general mean more happiness? We looked at some of our chronic disease and risk factors data to find out. We compared the % of adults reporting mental health issues against the affluence sub-score in the quality of life indexes:

So, in general, the answer is that affluent people are less likely to be depressed or report signs of poor mental health, although we note that the three most mentally fit segments are by no means the most affluent: 11 West Coast Affluence, 28 Coastal Diversity, and 29 Big Apple Dreamers.