In contrast to 30 years ago, American men are now happier than American women, the New York Times tells us - on its business pages. Is the same true here, I wonder? It probably is.
Some researchers are highly sceptical of measuring "happiness", feeling that it is unreliable pseudoscience. But it is a growing enterprise, run, interestingly, by economists rather than health researchers. The findings reported in the New York Times come from two different studies, which use different methods but reach similar conclusions. Indeed, one of the studies (pdf) - from the Wharton Business School (the "numbers" business school in the US) - uses multiple data sources from several countries, using different methods of measuring happiness, and reaches the same conclusion. The variety of methods and data sources can give us some confidence that the results are right - and that they apply in Britain as well as the US.
In the 1970s, some 40% of women and 30% of men described themselves as "very happy". Now, it's roughly the same percentage - 30% - for men and women, and slightly more women than men describe themselves as "not too happy". Since 1976, the number of male high-school seniors describing themselves as "very satisfied with their lives" has increased from 16% to 25%, while for females its has remained stuck at 22%.
Research from Princeton by Alan Krueger looked at the percentage of time women and men found a series of activities unpleasant and throws up results that could provide enough material for conversation for an entire dinner party. People were happiest in cafes or bars, with men finding only 2% of that activity unpleasant - perhaps when paying for their round. Women were unhappy for 6% of the time. The most unpleasant time was during medical care, with men finding 59% of it unpleasant, and women finding 50% of it unpleasant. Presumably, people weren't finding the rest of the time pleasant but merely neutral, although perhaps it can be fun chatting to a doctor about your many ills. Women probably found medical care less unpleasant than men because they are much more used to being prodded, poked and medicated - and are much better with pain than men.
Men found paid work unpleasant 26% of the time and women found it unpleasant 28% of the time. Men disliked home repairs (34% of the time), and gardening (17%), much more than women (20% and 9%), probably because much of the burden fell on them. But the most surprising finding was that men found spending time with parents unpleasant only 7% of the time compared with 27% of the time for women. A likely explanation is that men are sat on the sofa with their fathers drinking beer and watching a football match, whereas women are in the kitchen talking with their mothers about the deficiencies of their husbands and children and the plethora of family problems.
But the big question thrown up by all this research is why women should have become less happy while opportunities for women are proliferating and they are achieving equal status to men. Happiness is, of course, about the gap between aspirations and reality, and the aspirations of women may be increasing faster than the reality. Indeed, the aspirations may be becoming almost unsupportable.
An unnamed business school student explains it well in the New York Times article:
"Her mother's goals, the student said, were to have a beautiful garden, a well kept house, and well-adjusted children who did well in school. 'I sort of want those things too ... but I also want to have a great career and have an impact on the broader world.'"
Some of the explanation for the gap lies in how people spend their time. Compared with 40 years ago, American women are spending more time in paid work and less time doing housework. The average American woman used to spend 40 minutes more than the average man doing things she found unpleasant, whereas now the gap is 90 minutes. Men work less and relax more, while women have a longer "to do" list. Furthermore, women are probably more bothered by, and feel more guilty about, the dirty house than the men.
The answer has to be much more genuine sharing of responsibilities. As a new man, I used to fantasise about slippers ready and dinner on the table as I came home from work to find my wife exhausted, and launched into amusing the children and cooking. But I never ironed or worked the washing machine. It's time for us men to get off the sofa and into the kitchen - to join the debate over why our teenagers are running wild and when dad will have to go into a care home.
