Making Stuff Up

by Will Wilkinson on July 20, 2006

So, it turns out that I wasn’t crazy when I couldn’t find Vanuatu in the World Database of Happiness, because it’s not there! Carl Bialik at the WSJ has the story. Apparently NEF just made up Vanuatu’s life satisfaction number by extrapolation from other countries. But, truly, this competely defeats the purpose of self-reported life satisfaction. There are undoubtedly unique aspects of Vanuatu’s culture, economy, climate, character, etc., that would enter into their pattern of self-reports. So it’s pretty funny that Vanuatu “wins” in a much-touted index in part due to numbers the authors made up.

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Tim Worstall 2 years ago 1 point
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Check Wikipedia for "Tannu", one of the islands in Vanuatu. They worship Prince Phillip as a living God.

Clearly this is the secret to happiness.

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http://www.timworstall.com

Student 2 years ago 1 point
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You know, there is a difference between estimation and making stuff up. Just like there is a difference between a guess and an educated guess.

Sometimes you can really tell that you aren't an economist.

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