Red States Of Beatitude

The vast majority of us–even those who don’t take the longevity test discussed in the last post–are going to be around for the next four years.

How do we want to spend them?

Being very happy, of course!

So how do we do that?

In comes this year’s annual Pew Research Center’s happiness study, which surveys the population to find out who describes themselves as being "very happy," "pretty happy," or "not too happy" on most days.

It turns out that, overall, the population is 34% very happy, 50% pretty happy, and 15% not too happy (with 1% saying they couldn’t tell).

That’s good news in itself, but where the story gets interesting is looking at which groups within the populace are the most happy.

For example, Republicans are more happy than Democrats. (Big surprise, right?) But this isn’t just because there is a Republican administration right now. Republicans have had a happiness gap over Democrats ever since the annual survey was started back in 1972.

Conservatives (of either party) are happier than liberals (of either party).

People who go to church weekly are happier than people who don’t.

Married people are happier than single people.

People who live in the southern part of the United States are happier than those who live in the northern part.

And people also get happier as household income rises.

There are things that one can’t control that have bearings on reported happiness (health, age, sex, race, etc.), but within what one can control, it seems that the way to best fit the profile of the "very happy" people would be to adapt one’s lifestyle so that you become a married Southern conservative Republican church-goer who has done what is needed to ensure a good household income.

Of course, merely adapting your lifestyle to fit this profile may not make you happy. It may be that people who are natively happy are attracted to these things, rather than these things making people happy.

Or (more likely) it may be some of both. (For example, marriage might be a cause of happiness, while native unhappiness might be a cause of voting for a party that focuses heavily on grievances).

Just food for thought as you spend your next four years.

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Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live." View all posts by Jimmy Akin