Religion and happiness: cross-country comparisons

Will Wilkinson of the blog Fly Bottle has a nice discussion of claims about the role of religion in cross-national comparisons of happiness.

I think the key here may be mismeasurement of the religion "treatment". My sense is that for many Europeans political movements of various sorts play the same role that religion plays for many Americans. I am not the first to make this point, but political movements like environmentalism and feminism feature their own stories of original sin as well as sacraments (e.g. recycling) and the opportunity for redemption via faith (in political action) and works. They also offer social activities and a sense of contributing to and being a part of something larger than the self. To the extent that these movements, as well as social democracy (i.e. worship of the state) have replaced the traditional state-supported quasi-monopoly churches while playing the same role in generating (or not) individual happiness, then measures of religiosity that focus solely on church-going mismeasure the treatment in a way that varies systematically across countries.

Hat tip: marginal revolution