Updated
“An emerging branch of economics has begun to examine the empirical determinants of happiness. This paper continues that avenue of research in a different sphere. It focuses on the - still relatively unexplored - links between income, sexual activity and wellbeing.”

That has got to be one of the most, if not the most, interesting first paragraphs to have been published in an academic document in a long time.

I read this article in today’s Star newspaper which led me to the original working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (US) - Money, Sex and Happiness: An Empirical Study!

It’s hilarious! It must be one of the most fun economic studies ever conducted - I can just imagine how much fun the researchers must have had laughing their heads off analysing the data. The working paper is filled with such gems as:

we estimate what may be the first econometric happiness equations in which sexual activity is an independent variable

That is sooo funny… OK. If you don’t get it - sit through a whole year’s worth of econometrics. Then, you’ll get it! And you might then also find this hilarious:

Although, for the sake of persuasive identification, it would be desirable to have instrumental variables for sexual activity, in this paper we follow the simpler route of providing single-equation estimates with no adjustment for possible endogeneity. Our instinct is that solving the endogeneity problem — working out whether sex causes happiness or causality runs in the reverse direction — will be particularly difficult here. Future work will have to return to this issue.

And of course, there’s the obvious humour:

there is likely to be measurement error in these sexual data. One bias might stem from bravado; people may wish to appear to the survey interviewer to be enjoying more sex than they do. Another might stem from modesty or a wish to conceal extra-marital affairs; this would tend to lead to under-reporting. Our instinct from examining the data is that, if anything, the former bias dominates, especially among men.

or this one

males report more sex than females. Unless this is due to the existence of prostitutes, or to the greater prevalence of male homosexuality than female homosexuality, it is not easy to see how this gender difference can be genuine (as sex has to be with a woman).

and this gem of a sentence:

all the sex described in this paper refers to sex with a partner; masturbation is not discussed

I wonder, why not? They’re discussing just about everything else… hahahahaha…

But enough of the boring stuff. We want the real meaty, juicy, salacious details. What exactly is the correlation between sex and happiness?

Surprise, surprise. The authors concluded that “the more sex, the happier the person“. Idiots! I could have told them that without conducting the study!

It goes on to say that “both men and women get happiness from sex” and that “there is little evidence … that men enjoy sex slightly more than women”, i.e. everybody likes sex. Period.

The interesting observation from the study is that “sex may bring more happiness to the highly educated than to the less-educated.” The authors couldn’t explain this. I wonder why this is the case. Perhaps the more educated “intellectualise” their sexual experiences and that provides additional satisfaction if on a different level, i.e. the brains as well as their sexual organs get stimulated simultaneously!! Hmm… maybe that’s something institutes of higher learning could use to market their product: pursue higher studies, and earn greater sexual satisfaction!! That said, the authors also observed that highly educated males have less sex than average… I wonder if that then means highly educated males are less happy than average… ouch!

Updated at 1730H, 17 June:
Actually, this observation could probably be explained by linking two of the observations made by the authors. If educated individuals have less sex, then each sexual experience will naturally bring them marginally more value than it would the less educated. Voila!

You’re more likely to have higher numbers of sexual partners (than the average) if you’re: a less-educated female, a black person, a never-married male, a separated male, an unemployed person, homosexual or bisexual men or if your parents were divorced.

So if you’re female, white, straight, highly educated, gainfully employed and had a happy childhood, then tough on the sexual variety!

Here comes the more sobbering results:

• How many sexual partners will maximise a person’s happiness? ONE.
• People who say they have ever paid for sex are considerably less happy than others.
• Those who have ever had sex outside marriage also report notably low happiness scores.
• Married people have (much) more sex than people with other kinds of marital status.
• But, on average Americans have sex only two to three times per month…!
• Students have less sex than the average person their age.
• Homosexuals and bisexuals have no more sex than heterosexuals.
• Women who work part-time is associated with lower levels of sexual activity.
• Higher incomes does not buy happiness. Nor does it mean having greater numbers of sexual partners.

And the final clincher - black males report more sex than others!

I wonder how this study translates in Malaysian society…

Now go fuck like sex is about to go out of fashion - and make yourself super-happy!

  

Posted on June 17th, 2004 by jl
Filed under: Interesting Reads