Professor of Economics and Behavioural Science

Andrew Oswald's work lies mainly at the border between economics and behavioural science, and includes the empirical study of human happiness.

He is an ISI Highly-Cited Researcher and is credited with helping to create the field now known as the economics of happiness, which is one of the fastest growing within social science.

Andrew has worked on seven main areas: trade unions, labour contracts, the wage curve, entrepreneurship, home ownership and unemployment, the consequences of high oil prices, and the economics of happiness and mental health.

Find out more about Andrew at andrewoswald.com.

Research Interests

• Applied Economics and Quantitative Social Science.

Publications

For all Andrew Oswald's recent research papers, click here

Older Articles by Andrew Oswald

"Estimating the influence of life satisfaction and positive affect on later income using sibling fixed effects", with Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. Volume: 109 Issue: 49 Pages: 19953-19958 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1211437109, December 4 2012. PDF

"Evidence for a midlife crisis in great apes consistent with the U-shape in human well-being", with Weiss, Alexander; King, James E.; Inoue-Murayama, Miho. Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The USA, Volume: 109 Issue: 49 Pages: 19949-19952 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1212592109, December 4 2012 PDF

"Is Psychological Well-being Linked to the Consumption of Fruit and Vegetables?", with David G. Blanchflower and Sarah Stewart-Brown, forthcoming in Social Indicators Research. PDF

"How Should Peer-Review Panels Behave? ", with Daniel Sgroi, forthcoming in Economic Journal, May 2012. PDF

"Happiness and Productivity", with Eugenio Proto and Daniel Sgroi, May 2012. PDF

"Antidepressants and Age in 27 European Countries: Evidence of a U-Shape in Human Well-being Through Life", with David G. Blanchflower, March 2012. PDF

"An Introduction to the Structure of Biomarker Equations", with Nicholas A. Christakis and David G. Blanchflower, Working paper December 2011. PDF

"Well-being Across America", with Stephen Wu, Review of Economics and Statistics, 2011, 93, 1118-1134. PDF

"Dark Contrasts: The Paradox of High Rates of Suicide in Happy Places", with Mary Daly, Dan Wilson and Stephen Wu, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Volume: 80 Issue: 3 Pages: 435-442 DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2011.04.007, December 2011. PDF

"Do People Become Healthier After Being Promoted?", with Christopher Boyce, Health Economics, Volume: 21 Issue: 5 Pages: 580-596 DOI: 10.1002/hec.1734, May 2012. PDF

"International Happiness", with David G. Blanchflower, NBER paper, January 2011. PDF

"Are Happiness and Productivity Lower Among University Students With Newly-Divorced Parents? An Experimental Approach", with Eugenio Proto and Daniel Sgroi, Experimental Economics, Volume: 15 Issue: 1 Pages: 1-23 DOI: 10.1007/s10683-011-9285-5, March 2012. PDF

"Oil Prices, Profits, and Recessions: An Inquiry Using Terrorism as an Instrumental Variable", with Natalie Chen and Liam Graham, August 2007. PDF

"The Wage Curve Reloaded", with David Blanchflower, March 2005. PDF

"Does Inequality Reduce Happiness? Evidence from the States of the USA from the 1970s to the 1990s", March 2003. PDF

Publications: 2006 - 2011

"Why Do Leaders Matter? A Study of Expert Knowledge in a Superstar Setting", with Amanda H. Goodall and Lawrence M. Kahn, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2011, 77 (2011) 265-284. PDF

"Daughters and Leftwing Voting", with Nattavudh Powdthavee, Review of Economics and Statistics, 2010, 92(2), 213-227. PDF

"Emotional Prosperity and the Stiglitz Commission", British Journal of Industrial Relations, November 2010. PDF .

"Objective Confirmation of Subjective Measures of Human Well-being: Evidence from the USA", with Steve Wu, Science, February 2010. Abstract . PDF

"Hedonic Capital, Adaptation and Resilience", with Liam Graham, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, July 2010. PDF

"The Elite Brain Drain", with Rosalind S. Hunter and Bruce G. Charlton, Economic Journal, 2009, 119(538), F231-251. PDF

"Imitative Obesity and Relative Utility", with David G. Blanchflower and Bert Van Landeghem, Journal of European Economic Association, 2009, 7(2-3), 528-538. PDF

"On the Curvature of the Reporting Function from Objective Reality to Subjective Feelings", Economics Letters, 2008, 100, 369-372. PDF

"Is Well-Being U-Shaped over the Life Cycle?", with David Blanchflower, Social Science & Medicine, 2008, 66(6), 1733-1749. PDF

"Mortality and Immortality: The Nobel Prize as an Experiment into the Effect of Status upon Longevity", with Matthew D. Rablen, Journal of Health Economics, 2008, 27(6), 1462-1471. PDF

"Does Happiness Adapt? A Longitudinal Study of Disability with Implications for Economists and Judges", with Nattavudh Powdthavee, Journal of Public Economics, 2008, 92(5-6), 1061-1077. PDF

"Death, Happiness, and the Calculation of Compensatory Damages", with Nattavudh Powdthavee, Journal of Legal Studies, 2008, 37(S2), S217-S252. PDF

"Does Wage Rank Affect Employees' Well-Being?", with Gordon Brown et al, Industrial Relations, 2008, 47(3), 355-389. PDF

"Human Well-being and Causality in Social Epidemiology", International Journal of Epidemiology, 2007, 36(6), 1253-1254. PDF

"Hypertension and Happiness across Nations", with David Blanchflower, Journal of Health Economics, 2008, 27(2), 218-233. PDF

"Obesity, Unhappiness, and The Challenge of Affluence: Theory and Evidence", with Nattavudh Powdthavee, Economic Journal, 2007, 117(521), F441-454. PDF

"An Examination of the Reliability of Prestigious Scholarly Journals: Evidence and Implications for Decision-Makers", Economica, 2007, 74, 21-31. PDF

"Money and Mental Wellbeing: A Longitudinal Study of Medium-Sized Lottery Wins", with Jonathan Gardner, Journal of Health Economics, 2007, 26, 49-60. PDF

"Do Divorcing Couples Become Happier By Breaking Up?", with Jonathan Gardner, Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series A, 2006, 169(2), 319-336. PDF

Some Further Publications

Students

• Luc Tucker: Political economy. Voting
• Neel Sagar: Personality. Labour market models
• Nattavudh Powdthavee: Perceived Quality of Life Data in the Developing Countries. Labour and Development Economics. Happiness
• Alexander Herzog-Stein: Labour Economics, Game Theory, Strategic Bargaining
• Ulli Stein: Labour Economics, Pension Systems in the UK and Germany, Microeconomic Theory
• Matthew Rablen: Psychological Theories of Utility and Happiness.
• Andrea Salvatori: Labour Economics, Microeconometrics, Subjective Well-Being Data
• Chris Boyce: Social Comparisons, Status and Subjective Well-Being Data
• Andrew Siu: Behavioural and Experimental Economics

Other information

Current Working Papers and Non-Technical Articles

Home Ownership Data

(i)Data (ii) Data Description.