That\’s what we\’re told, right?
Louisiana is the happiest state in the US, followed by Hawaii and Florida. The unhappiest states are West Virgina, Rhode Island and Pennsylvania,
Ah, perhaps it isn\’t in fact true then?
Here\’s a list of States with their Gini.
Purely by eyeballing it seems that Louisiana and Florida have above average inequality while Rhode Island and Pennsylvania seem to be at or below said average (if anyone has the maths to either confirm this relationship of graph it, feel free to post it up somewhere so I can link).
Which rather puts paid to hte idea in The Spirit Level that inequality makes people unhappy, doesn\’t it?
You should find USGINI1999.xls here, and USGINI1999.bmp here.
Hmmm.
I wonder how they measure happiness. I lived in Louisiana for 9 years, and found the typical native to be rather unhappy. On the other hand, they punctuated that unhappiness with a willingness to bust loose and have a good time with more frequency and gusto than I’ve seen elsewhere.
P.S. You borrowed one of the (true) typos I’m known for: “hte” instead of “the”.