The paradox of unhappy growth: Is the US an outlier?
This piece summarizes findings from a research paper by the authors, published here .
本文总结了作者发表在此处的研究论文的发现。
The United States seems unusual among wealthy and middle-income countries.
在富裕和中等收入国家中，美国似乎很不寻常。
It has had consistently high economic growth for the past three decades (the 2008 global financial crisis excepted), yet consistent declines in well-being: in life satisfaction, hope, trust in others, and self-reported health.
过去三十年来，它的经济持续高速增长（2008年全球金融危机除外），但福祉却持续下降：生活满意度、希望、对他人的信任以及自我报告的健康状况。
This pattern runs counter to a core tenet of neoclassical economics: that higher income allows people to achieve higher levels of utility.
这种模式违背了新古典经济学的核心原则：更高的收入使人们能够实现更高水平的效用。
Research has generally reinforced this, at least in cross-sectional analyses .
研究普遍强化了这一点，至少在横截面分析中是如此。
Easterlin (1974) was among the first to show that this relationship breaks down (i.e., is not statistically significant) when comparing changes in income with changes in well-being, giving rise to the well-known “Easterlin Paradox.”
Easterlin (1974) 是最先表明在比较收入变化与福祉变化时这种关系破裂（即不具有统计显着性）的人之一，从而产生了著名的“伊斯特林悖论”。
Stevenson and Wolfers (2008) later suggested that the Easterlin Paradox largely reflected the imprecision of panel analysis: income growth does tend to improve life satisfaction, aligning with the basic logic that poor people often lack quality jobs, food, healthcare, housing, education, and other factors central to wellbeing.
史蒂文森和沃尔弗斯（Stevenson and Wolfers，2008）后来提出，伊斯特林悖论在很大程度上反映了面板分析的不精确性：收入增长确实往往会提高生活满意度，这与贫困人口往往缺乏优质工作、食品、医疗保健、住房、教育和其他对福祉至关重要的因素的基本逻辑是一致的。
Low or unstable incomes also limit people’s freedom to choose the kinds of lives they want, and often coincide with weak public institutions, poor infrastructure, and less public safety.
收入低或不稳定也限制了人们选择自己想要的生活的自由，而且往往与公共机构薄弱、基础设施薄弱和公共安全较差同时发生。
Generally, income plays a role in increasing well-being by addressing some of these deficits.
一般来说，收入通过解决其中一些赤字在增加福祉方面发挥着作用。
At the same time, the distribution of income and related benefits can vary widely even among wealthy countries.
与此同时，即使在富裕国家之间，收入和相关福利的分配也可能存在很大差异。
Several scholars have explored the mediating role of other factors, such as the distribution of income and opportunities , social capital , social safety nets , and environmental quality , in both rich and poor countries.
一些学者探讨了其他因素的中介作用，例如富国和穷国的收入和机会分配、社会资本、社会安全网和环境质量。
Yet there remains debate on the income-well-being relationship, with many studies finding either that growth does not necessarily improve well-being or more nuanced patterns .
然而，关于收入与福祉的关系仍然存在争议，许多研究发现，经济增长并不一定会改善福祉，或者存在更微妙的模式。
Graham et al (2017), for instance, find that as China’s growth rates were among the world’s highest from 1995-2005, life satisfaction plummeted and suicides increased .
例如，Graham 等人（2017）发现，从 1995 年到 2005 年，中国的增长率位居世界前列，生活满意度直线下降，自杀率上升。
We build on this work by considering more recent data, a broader range of subjective well-being measures, and the unusual case of the United States compared with other wealthy countries.
我们在这项工作的基础上考虑了最新的数据、更广泛的主观幸福感衡量标准，以及美国与其他富裕国家相比的不寻常案例。
This was motivated by a recent State of the Nation Project report.
这是由最近的一份国情项目报告推动的。
That report covered many measures (such as child poverty and political polarization) and was not focused on the income-well-being relationship, but one pattern jumped out: despite higher economic growth than most other wealthy economies, the U.S. has worsened over the past two decades on almost every available subjective well-being measure: life satisfaction, depression, emotional support, trust in other people, and trust in institutions.
该报告涵盖了许多指标（例如儿童贫困和政治两极分化），并没有关注收入与福祉的关系，但有一个模式跳出来：尽管美国的经济增长高于大多数其他富裕经济体，但美国在过去二十年中几乎所有可用的主观福祉指标都在恶化：生活满意度、抑郁、情感支持、对他人的信任和对机构的信任。
Our recently published analysis tested whether these declines make the U.S. an outlier internationally, a question that matters for understanding progress in terms of people’s lives, not just economic output.
我们最近发表的分析测试了这些下降是否使美国在国际上成为异类，这个问题对于理解人们生活的进步很重要，而不仅仅是经济产出。
We use eleven measures available in the Gallup World Poll: freedom to choose how to live one’s life, hope, life satisfaction, experiencing pain, being respected, sadness, smiling, social support, trust in the courts, trust in government, and being worried.
我们使用盖洛普世界民意调查中提供的十一项衡量标准：选择如何生活的自由、希望、生活满意度、经历痛苦、受到尊重、悲伤、微笑、社会支持、对法院的信任、对政府的信任以及担忧。
We refer to these collectively as “well-being.”
我们将这些统称为“幸福感”。
Several of these measures are important beyond well-being itself.
其中一些措施的重要性超出了福祉本身。
Life satisfaction and hope shape behavioral choices and longer term outcomes .
生活满意度和希望塑造行为选择和长期结果。
Social support (i.e., emotional support from other people) is a key determinant of broader well-being.
社会支持（即来自其他人的情感支持）是更广泛福祉的关键决定因素。
Trust in courts and governments reflect confidence in a country’s institutions, the same institutions necessary to address what ails us.
对法院和政府的信任反映了对一个国家机构的信心，这些机构也是解决我们问题所必需的。
1 Some studies even find reported well-being predicts voting trends better than standard economic explanations.
1 一些研究甚至发现，报告的幸福感比标准的经济解释更能预测投票趋势。
In what follows, we discuss results from panel data analysis to test whether the U.S. is an outlier in declining well-being despite rising average income, across 44 middle- and high-income countries 2 using Gallup World Poll data from 2006-2024.
接下来，我们将使用 2006 年至 2024 年盖洛普世界民意调查数据讨论 44 个中等收入和高收入国家 2 的面板数据分析结果，以测试尽管平均收入上升，美国是否是福祉下降的异常值。
The results from our first analysis are depicted in Figure 1, which reports the composite measure for each country.
我们第一次分析的结果如图 1 所示，其中报告了每个国家/地区的综合衡量标准。
This confirms that overall U.S. well-being has been on the decline since 2006, but it is not an outlier.
这证实了自 2006 年以来美国整体福祉一直在下降，但这并非异常值。
Cyprus and Greece show visibly larger declines, and equal numbers of countries show statistically significant improvement (17 countries) and decline (17 countries).
塞浦路斯和希腊的降幅明显更大，统计上显着改善（17 个国家）和下降（17 个国家）的国家数量相同。
The remainder show no clear change.
其余部分没有明显变化。
The magnitude of the declines is non-trivial.
下降的幅度不容小觑。
In the U.S., the share of respondents responding positively declined by about seven percentage points, from a baseline mean of about 77%, which is a roughly 9% decline.
在美国，积极回应的受访者比例从约 77% 的基线平均值下降了约 7 个百分点，下降了约 9%。
Notes: These are percentage-point changes in the within-respondent SWB composite, using the full information available for each country: baselines are the earliest feasible year (2006-2009) and endpoints the latest (2023-2024), with per-country years listed in Appendix Table 1.
注：这些是受访者内部主观幸福感综合数据的百分比变化，使用了每个国家现有的完整信息：基线是最早可行的年份（2006-2009年），终点是最晚的年份（2023-2024年），附录表1列出了每个国家的年份。
Solid fill marks changes whose 95% confidence interval excludes zero; the United States is the diamond.
实心填充标记变化，其 95% 置信区间不包括零；美国是钻石。
The right side of the figure reports the baseline composite level (%) as a basis of comparison.
图右侧报告了基线综合水平（%）作为比较的基础。
95% confidence intervals shown.
显示 95% 置信区间。
In addition to using the full span of data available (2006-2024), we restricted to the 2016-2024 period to test whether 2006 was a fluke that distorted the trends and whether the patterns might have been driven by the 2008 Great Recession.
除了使用完整的可用数据（2006-2024年）外，我们还限制在2016-2024年期间来测试2006年是否是扭曲趋势的侥幸，以及这些模式是否可能是由2008年大衰退驱动的。
But the downward trends are roughly evenly split between the two periods.
但两个时期的下降趋势大致平分秋色。
This suggests that the downward trends are meaningful and steady across the roughly two-decade period.
这表明，在大约二十年的时间里，下降趋势是有意义且稳定的。
We cannot say whether the Great Recession was a cause.
我们不能说大衰退是否是一个原因。
It could be that, with this economic calamity, well-being would have flattened out rather than continue its prior decline.
在这场经济灾难中，福祉可能会趋于平缓，而不是继续之前的下降趋势。
What we can say is that other factors must have been at work; otherwise, it would be difficult to explain the decline from 2016-2024.
我们可以说肯定还有其他因素在起作用。否则，很难解释2016-2024年的下降。
The well-being patterns also fit a broader convergence phenomenon: countries that started with lower well-being scores tend to improve, while countries that started higher may stagnate or decline.
这些福祉模式也符合更广泛的趋同现象：福祉得分较低的国家往往会有所改善，而福祉得分较高的国家可能会停滞或下降。
The term “happiness convergence” has been used to describe the closing life satisfaction gap between countries transitioning out of communism and non-transition countries.
“幸福趋同”一词被用来描述摆脱共产主义转型的国家和非转型国家之间日益缩小的生活满意度差距。
Recent World Poll rankings show a similar gradual convergence in life evaluations between Eastern and Western Europe , with several Central and Eastern European countries showing the largest gains in youth life evaluations since 2006-2010.
最近的世界民意调查排名显示，东欧和西欧之间的生活评价也出现了类似的逐渐趋同，一些中欧和东欧国家的青年生活评价取得了自2006年至2010年以来的最大进步。
Our analysis provides additional evidence for convergence.
我们的分析为收敛性提供了额外的证据。
The 17 countries with declining well-being are almost all Western with initial composite well-being scores in the 70s and 80s (on a 0-100 scale).
福祉下降的 17 个国家几乎都是西方国家，其初始综合福祉得分在 70 年代和 80 年代（0-100 分制）。
The other 17 countries with rising well-being are almost all Eastern European with much lower initial composite wellbeing scores in the 50s and 60s.
其他 17 个幸福感上升的国家几乎都是东欧国家，其初始综合幸福感得分要低得多，处于 50 年代和 60 年代。
3 However, convergence usually refers to the idea that people at a low level have an easier time catching up, not that those doing well actually decline.
3 然而，趋同通常是指处于低水平的人更容易赶上，而不是那些表现好的人实际上会下降。
The improvement in Eastern Europe might therefore be part of a convergence story, but the absolute decline in Western well-being is not, and it is the real cause for concern.
因此，东欧的改善可能是趋同故事的一部分，但西方福祉的绝对下降却不是，这才是令人担忧的真正原因。
Figure 2 takes a microscope to the U.S. and breaks the composite measure above into the separate measures.
图 2 以显微镜观察美国，并将上述综合措施分解为单独的措施。
This shows the U.S. composite decline from Figure 1 is dominated by four constructs: hope (7 percentage point decline), freedom (19), trust in courts (24), and trust in government (31).
这表明图 1 中的美国综合下降主要由四个概念主导：希望（下降 7 个百分点）、自由 (19)、对法院的信任 (24) 和对政府的信任 (31)。
Notes: This figure shows the changes in the individual well-being measures for the U.S. only, each over its own full-information window (the literal earliest to latest fielded year; a few measures were introduced after 2006 and use a later start, with anchor years listed in Appendix Table 1).
注：该图仅显示美国个人福祉指标的变化，每个指标在其各自的完整信息窗口内（字面上最早到最晚的实施年份；一些指标是在 2006 年之后引入的，并使用较晚的开始时间，锚定年份列于附录表 1）。
The top row is the U.S. composite, identical to Figure 1 in the main text; the measure changes are estimated separately and need not aggregate to the composite.
最上面一行是美国综合指数，与正文中的图 1 相同；衡量指标的变化是单独估计的，不需要汇总到综合数据中。
The right side reports the U.S. baseline level (%) for each row.
右侧报告每行的美国基线水平 (%)。
Fill and symbols are as in Figure 1 in the main text.
填充和符号如图正文中的图1。
95% confidence intervals shown.
显示 95% 置信区间。
At first, the insignificant decline in life satisfaction seems to conflict with the State of the Nation Project, where we found a steeper decline in life satisfaction as well.
起初，生活满意度的轻微下降似乎与国情项目相冲突，我们发现生活满意度的下降幅度也更大。
But this seeming discrepancy reflects two different ways of reporting the data.
但这种看似差异反映了两种不同的数据报告方式。
In Figure 2, we chose to report the percentage of people with high life satisfaction (in the 7-10 range on a 10-points scale), to align with the way the other well-being measures are worded.
在图 2 中，我们选择报告生活满意度高的人的百分比（10 分制，在 7-10 范围内），以与其他幸福感衡量标准的措辞方式保持一致。
In contrast, in the State of the Nation Project, we used the full 0-10 scale and reported the average.
相比之下，在国家状况项目中，我们使用完整的 0-10 等级并报告平均值。
The fact that we see a larger decline with the full scale means that many Americans continue to be quite satisfied but that others are increasingly unhappy.
事实上，我们看到整体下降幅度更大，这意味着许多美国人仍然相当满意，但其他人却越来越不满意。
Nations also fared differently economically over these two decades, so it’s worth testing whether income growth explains the patterns above.
在这二十年里，各国的经济表现也有所不同，因此值得检验收入增长是否可以解释上述模式。
To test this, we regress changes in each measure on changes in real per-capita income, interacted with a U.S. indicator to test whether the U.S. converts income into well-being less effectively than other countries do.
为了检验这一点，我们将每项指标的变化与实际人均收入的变化进行回归，并与美国指标进行交互，以测试美国将收入转化为福祉的效率是否低于其他国家。
We repeat this, and all the other, analyses on a composite index of all eleven well-being measures.
我们重复这一点以及所有其他分析，对所有十一项福祉指标的综合指数进行分析。
The interaction coefficient is negative for the composite measure and for eight of the eleven specific measures, and this holds up using a log specification of income (so it is not just diminishing marginal utility).
综合衡量指标和十一个具体衡量指标中的八个的交互系数为负，并且使用收入的对数规范也能证明这一点（因此它不仅仅是边际效用递减）。
We emphasize that the data do not allow precise estimation of how the U.S. differs from the global income-wellbeing gradient, but the pattern is notable.
我们强调，这些数据无法准确估计美国与全球收入福祉梯度的差异，但这种模式值得注意。
Overall, the U.S. appears worse than the average country at converting income into well-being.
总体而言，美国在将收入转化为福祉方面似乎比一般国家更差。
Our results suggest the U.S. is an outlier primarily for trust in courts and the government, and freedom to choose in life.
我们的结果表明，美国主要在对法院和政府的信任以及生活选择自由方面是一个异常值。
The 2008 Great Recession may have been one contributor to this.
2008 年的经济大衰退可能是造成这种情况的原因之一。
This was the deepest and longest economic collapse since the Great Depression and hit Western nations hardest.
这是大萧条以来最严重、持续时间最长的经济崩溃，对西方国家打击最严重。
In the U.S., the government’s response was widely perceived as favoring banks and large companies over the average American, and job and home losses left many with less freedom of choice.
在美国，人们普遍认为政府的应对措施有利于银行和大公司，而不是普通美国人，而失业和住房的损失让许多人的选择自由度降低。
The response to the financial crisis is likely one reason behind the U.S. decline in trust in the courts and government.
对金融危机的反应可能是美国对法院和政府信任度下降的原因之一。
That distrust, in turn, may be fueling, and being fueled by, political polarization.
反过来，这种不信任可能会助长政治两极分化，并受到政治两极分化的助长。
The United States now ranks as the most polarized democracy in the developed world.
美国现在被列为发达国家中两极分化最严重的民主国家。
When partisans see political opponents as enemies rather than fellow citizens, that spills into how they judge the economy and their own lives, so that a large share of the population is, at any given moment, primed to see things as going badly.
当党派将政治对手视为敌人而不是同胞时，这就会影响到他们如何判断经济和自己的生活，因此很大一部分人在任何特定时刻都准备好看到事情正在恶化。
The emergence of Donald Trump, who has been highly critical of the courts and the government since 2015, may have compounded this.
唐纳德·特朗普(Donald Trump)自2015年以来一直对法院和政府持严厉批评，他的出现可能让这一情况变得更加复杂。
By 2026, only 12% of Democrats were satisfied with our system of government , versus 52% of Republicans.
到 2026 年，只有 12% 的民主党人对我们的政府体系感到满意，而共和党人的这一比例为 52%。
This is the first time either party has fallen below 20%.
这是双方首次跌破 20%。
Longer term trends have also played a role.
长期趋势也发挥了作用。
The U.S. has historically been seen as a land of opportunity, but we showed in the State of the Nation Project that income inequality is worsening, and the U.S. now ranks in the bottom quartile of middle- and high-income countries.
美国历来被视为机遇之地，但我们在《国情报告》中表明，收入不平等正在恶化，美国目前在中等收入和高收入国家中排名倒数四分之一。
Intergenerational mobility tells the same story.
代际流动性讲述了同样的故事。
A 10 percentile increase in parent income is associated with only a 3.4 percentile increase in the child’s future income.
父母收入增加 10 个百分点，孩子未来收入仅增加 3.4 个百分点。
Mobility and inequality are related.
流动性和不平等是相关的。
When gaps become too large, those at the bottom have a more difficult time breaking out of the pattern, widening gaps in children’s opportunities .
当差距变得太大时，处于底层的人就更难摆脱这种模式，从而扩大了儿童机会的差距。
Belief that hard work guarantees success has also been steadily dropping since 2001 in the U.S. We plan to test the link between declining opportunity and declining well-being in future research.
自 2001 年以来，在美国，“努力工作保证成功”的信念也在稳步下降。我们计划在未来的研究中测试机会减少与福祉下降之间的联系。
Social media and smartphone use may also be pushing well-being down globally, in part by displacing in-person interaction .
社交媒体和智能手机的使用也可能导致全球幸福感下降，部分原因是取代了面对面的互动。
Americans in particular score very low on social support and time spent socializing, and there is also now robust evidence that device use has contributed to rising loneliness , particularly among younger people, which is consistent with the sharp declines we observe in youth mental health.
尤其是美国人在社会支持和社交时间方面的得分非常低，而且现在也有强有力的证据表明，设备的使用导致了孤独感的上升，特别是在年轻人中，这与我们观察到的青少年心理健康状况的急剧下降是一致的。
Social media’s link to life evaluations is stronger in English-speaking countries and Western Europe , though the World Happiness Report (2026) found this doesn’t fully explain the broader Western decline.
在英语国家和西欧，社交媒体与生活评价的联系更为紧密，尽管《世界幸福报告》（2026 年）发现这并不能完全解释西方国家普遍衰落的原因。
This is a question for further research.
这是一个有待进一步研究的问题。
Other forces have likely hurt the West more broadly over the past two decades.
在过去二十年里，其他力量可能更广泛地伤害了西方。
A widening gap in opportunity and quality of life between workers with and without bachelor’s degrees, and the political backlash it has fueled, is visible well beyond the U.S. – in support for Brexit, for instance, and the return of the far right in France and Germany.
有学士学位和没有学士学位的工人之间在机会和生活质量方面不断扩大的差距，以及由此引发的政治反弹，在美国以外的地方也很明显——例如对英国脱欧的支持，以及法国和德国极右翼的回归。
In the U.S., this has coincided with a crisis of “deaths of despair” (i.e., deaths from alcohol, drugs, and suicide) that has spread from middle-aged whites to youth and minorities .
在美国，这恰逢一场“绝望死亡”（即因酗酒、吸毒和自杀而死亡）的危机，这场危机已从中年白人蔓延到年轻人和少数族裔。
Yet the effects on well-being appear starker in the U.S., likely reflecting its thinner social contract—something the unequal distribution of hope in the U.S. also reflects.
然而，对美国福祉的影响似乎更加明显，这可能反映出其社会契约较薄弱——美国希望分配不均也反映了这一点。
Wealthy Western countries share other problems, too: youth mental health crises ( worse in the Anglo-Saxon countries ), damaging social media use, weakening social ties, and eroding opportunities for workers.
富裕的西方国家也存在其他问题：青年心理健康危机（在盎格鲁撒克逊国家更严重）、损害社交媒体的使用、削弱社会关系以及侵蚀工人的机会。
Addressing these problems, even where less severe than in the U.S., will improve wellbeing gains globally.
解决这些问题，即使没有美国那么严重，也将改善全球的福祉。
Whatever the underlying causes, this combination of rising income and declining well-being suggests a paradox of unhappy growth, with the U.S. as its most extreme case.
无论根本原因是什么，收入增加和福祉下降的这种结合表明了增长不佳的悖论，其中美国是最极端的例子。
The U.S. converts income growth into well-being gains less “efficiently” than other countries, likely reflecting rising inequality, the spread of social media, and extreme political polarization, and compounded by a deeply rooted culture of individualism and distrust of social support.
与其他国家相比，美国将收入增长转化为福祉收益的“效率”较低，这可能反映出不平等加剧、社交媒体传播和极端政治两极分化，以及根深蒂固的个人主义文化和对社会支持的不信任。
As work and civic life change dramatically, the American dream cannot hold if its targets (income and societal well-being) remain disconnected.
随着工作和公民生活发生巨大变化，如果其目标（收入和社会福祉）仍然脱节，美国梦就无法实现。
The authors would like to thank Jaxson Shealy for excellent fact-checking assistance and helpful comments.
作者要感谢 Jaxson Shealy 提供的出色的事实核查帮助和有益的评论。
The Brookings Institution is committed to quality, independence, and impact.
布鲁金斯学会致力于质量、独立性和影响力。
We are supported by a diverse array of funders .
我们得到了众多资助者的支持。
In line with our values and policies , each Brookings publication represents the sole views of its author(s).
根据我们的价值观和政策，布鲁金斯学会的每份出版物均代表其作者的唯一观点。