Does Religion Make You Happy? (Ep. 176)
(Photo: www.CGPGrey.com)
This week’s episode is called “Does Religion Make You Happy?” (You can subscribe to the podcast at iTunes, get the RSS feed, or listen via the media player above. You can also read the transcript, which includes credits for the music you’ll hear in the episode.)
We undertook this episode in response to a listener question from Joel Rogers, a tax accountant in Birmingham, Ala. Here’s what he wrote:
Being devout Southern Baptists my parents have steadfastly been giving 10% of their income to the church their whole lives. I recently voiced my opinion that I thought that was too [much to] give, and my parents and I got into an argument.
After a little back-and-forth, my parents conceded tithing at 10% may not be the exact amount ‘God’ expects, but my mother said something that stuck with me. She said the 10% they give to the church makes them happier than anything else they spend money on.
I’ve read that people who go to religious institutions consistently are happier than their counterparts. The economist inside me says that money (not given to the church) would make a non-tither happier, all things equal. So, will exchanging 10% of your income for the right to participate in a religious congregation statistically increase or decrease your happiness?
Joel is in effect asking two questions, related but separate. One is whether giving away money – in this case, to a religious institution – makes you happier. The other is whether religion itself makes you happier. Neither question is easy to answer, but we’ll do our best.
In the episode you’ll hear from Laurence Iannaccone, an economist at Chapman University who specializes in the economics of religion. Iannaccone says there is a strong correlation between religious giving and happiness but, as you’ll find out, just because giving and happiness seem to go hand in hand doesn’t mean the giving causes the happiness.
You’ll also hear from MIT economist Jonathan Gruber, who has done quite a bit of research on these topics. In “Pay or Pray? The Impact of Charitable Subsidies on Religious Attendance” (abstract; PDF), Gruber tried to determine whether giving money to church is a complement to religious attendance or a substitute — and, whether it’s the giving or the going that actually makes people better off. Here’s his suggestion for the Rogers Family:
GRUBER: I would say if it’s really going … to church that matters for them, for their happiness and well-being, then they should maybe even give less and just go more.
And here’s what Gruber found in his paper “Religious Market Structure, Religious Participation, and Outcomes: Is Religion Good for You?” (abstract; PDF):
GRUBER: [The religious are] more likely to have higher incomes, higher education, have more stable marriages, be less likely to be on welfare, essentially be more successful on any economic measure you want to use.
In the podcast, Stephen Dubner also wonders: what if you’ve been giving to your church but find you’re no better off in the long run? As it turns out, some churches, like NewSpring in South Carolina, offer a money-back guarantee.
Finally: a big thanks to the Rogers Family (as well as to WBHM producer Andrew Yeager), who let us go to church with them at Grace Life Baptist Church in McCalla, Alabama.
John Guilt
Shorter: there are many situations in which expressing unhappiness were dangerous, and so saying and even formally believing that one were happy were protective, and so self-reportage about happiness is not trust-worthy...and these situations obtain for the religious, and all the more so in the member-of-the-majority cases highlighted in the piece.
(Plus: rampant sociobiological speculation, in a footnote [God help me], on why it's important for working people to be unhappy, and vital that people on welfare be miserable...it's about Justice, as seen from the top downward.)
It was good to see some objective measures, particularly fractional dependence in welfare*, mentioned because self-reportage of happiness is unreliable. This is particularly so in close-knit communities in which unhappiness were seen as sinful, treacherous, or (when expressed) dangerous to prized beliefs and the community built around them, or at least improper whinging. A brainwashed cult devotee insisting on their [sic] happiness is an hyperbolic example of the trope, but a better exemplar, stereotypical but with roots in reality, is the '50s house-wife who knows that she's supposed to be much happier as June Cleaver than she was as Rosie the Riveter, and will say so, but the tranquiliser ads aimed at her doctor---on which men with some noticeable power decided to spend noticeable money, so you know they were serious---tell a different story.
(My own consciousness, of course, maps isomorphically to reality and so has not an iota of falseness to it, and my self-reportage is flawlessly accurate....) (...and by that I mean that I shouldn't look down on people for needing to believe that they are happy when it's entirely possible that there's an equally large log in _my_ eye or larger, the pressures of life and the group can certainly provide great incentive to act happy, and knowing that you're not happy far from guaranties getting any happier.)
*Welfare is _supposed_ to make people even unhappier than work makes most of us; the first is informed by horror at the notion that a lowest-status person might ever have a really happy day they don't deserve, the second by the evolved wisdom that happy people's genes tell them they must be fairly high up in the primate band's hierarchy, at which point they start to be a threat to those actually high up there---in modern democracies, this takes the form of pointed questions about how spoils have been and are divvied-up, the sanity of the band's tabu structure and morés, and generally acting as if they had rights!
Colson
Does giving money to Freakonomics Radio increase enjoyment of listening to it? If so, this seems like a reason for supporting a church you actively participate in.
Rachel
I just finished listening to this podcast. I also finished "Think Like A Freak" last night. Love the book!! Did not agree with the podcast. It seemed a bit off. I guess you were limited based on the question, which someone previously mentioned (including the "right" to go to church).
Let me be clear, I am not religious at all. I tried it. I don't like it. However, I did read a book "Thou Shall Prosper" by Rabbi Daniel Lappin. I am not against learning from, or being friends with, devout individuals. It was a good book. I learned a bit about the Jewish I had not thought about before. He discusses why many Jewish people are very happy and prosperous, and they tithe. They have close community, like minded groups, meet often, help each other, etc. etc. The Mormons seem the same. So do non-religious groups where the people are close knit and help each other.
Perhaps it is not the tithing or the religion that makes people happy. John mentions the community issue only slightly. I can say that when I finally found a "community" of people that accepted me and I felt comfortable with them, I have been much happier. That group is a bunch of military veterans.
The previous group I was involved in included religious individuals. But I was not happy. Most just didn't accept me. I only put up with it because we all had children in the same school groups and wanted the same things for our kids. But, I never felt "community" nor felt I belonged and was always treated like an outsider.
I believe happiness comes from acceptance and community inclusion. It is human, biological, whether or not there is tithing or religion.
Just my 2 cents. thanks for sharing.
John Guilt
I can't speak to the book, as I haven't read it yet, but note that R. Lapin is politically quite right-wing, and more to the point believes all of those values completely consonant with Jewish values. I strongly doubt that he would intentionally slant his description of 'the Jewish' (as you put it) to match his politics, but he's human, so it might be in the mix---I certainly see distortions in descriptions of traditionally Jewish values on the part of some with whose politics I _agree_, and (to be frank) I have seen this in what of Lapin's work I've seen, though that doesn't mean it were really there, I being human.
Kath
Did it occur to anyone that it is the act of giving, of your own free will, that brings happiness? The gift could be to a charity not a church. After all charity is another word for love. To love and be loved is true happiness.
Dale
Is there causation, and if so which way does it run?
We know that people who are lucky economically are more likely to assume that life is fair; are the lucky more likely to presume this fairness comes from a just god?
And we know that people who meet random economic failure are less likely to assume that life is fair; if the world is unjust, do the unlucky then reject religion, which claims the opposite?
Or is believing in the same religion as your community simply rewarded with economic assistance from your co-believers? A local religious safety-net.
James
Now that I think on it, I have to question the claim that religion makes people happier. I have seen, fairly recently, graphs of happiness by state, like these: https://www.google.com/search?q=graph+happiness+by+state&complete=0&site=webhp&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=xwzTU-6uJcehogS75YFY&ved=0CD8QsAQ&biw=1133&bih=941#facrc=_&imgdii=_
which seem to show that the areas with lowest church attendance, like the west and northeast, tend to be happier than places with high attendance rates. Anyone care to explain this? Or of course show that my Google searches came up with erroneous data.
Stfn
Community, no matter what topic unites, will bring contentment and happiness. Couple this with religion's promise of salvation and the like, you're going to have a happy bunch of people, and I say this as a staunch atheist.
Michael Sikivie
It could easily be self-selection. If I'm a very religious Catholic, I'm more likely to self-select into living in Boston than a less serious Catholic, while a more serious Lutheran is more likely to self-select into living in Minneapolis than a less serious Lutheran. Then, because I'm surrounded by my own people who are more likely to help me, I'm more successful, more stable marriages etc. So this shows you're more successful when surrounded by your own community, but not that the religion itself makes you better off.