Chloé Michel, Michelle Sovinsky, Eugenio Proto and Andrew Oswald, The CAGE Background Briefing Series No. 98, May 2019

Although the negative impact of conspicuous consumption has been discussed for more than a century, the link between advertising and individual is not well understood. This column uses longitudinal data for 27 countries in Europe linking change in life satisfaction to variation in advertising spend. The results show a large negative correlation that cannot be attributed to the business cycle or individual characteristics.

Behavioural Economics and Wellbeing