The happiness of Vietnamese - micro-analysis of happiness determinants in the case of Binh Dinh Province.pdf

1. i
UNIVERSITY OF ECONOMICS
HO CHI MINH CITY
VIETNAM
INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL STUDIES
THE HAGUES
THE NETHERLANDS
VIETNAM – NETHERLANDS
PROGRAMME FOR M.A IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS
THE HAPPINESS OF VIETNAMESE: MICRO-ANALYSIS
OF HAPPINESS DETERMINANTS IN THE CASE OF
BINH DINH PROVINCE
A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of
MASTER OF ARTS IN DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS
By
HO DAI NGHIA
Academic Supervisor:
Dr. TRAN ANH TUAN
HO CHI MINH CITY, AUGUST 2013

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Acknowledgements
During the time of studying in Vietnam – Netherlands programme for Master of
Arts in Developing Economics, I have learned so much helpful knowledge.
Therefore, I would like to thank to Programme and all the teachers that have
taught me in this time.
I would like to express the deepest appreciation to my research supervisors, Dr.
Anh Tuan, for his patient guidance, industrious encouragement and fruitful
critiques of this research work. Besides my supervisor, I want to acknowledge
the tremendous support that I received from Dr. Pham Khanh Nam and Prof. Dr.
Nguyen Trong Hoai for giving me constructive comments and warm
encouragement.
I would like to offer my special thanks to many friends at People's Committee of
Binh Dinh for your assistance and helpful advice with the eye glance data
reduction process. Without your guidance and persistent help this thesis would
not have been possible. I am particularly grateful for the assistance given by the
officer of my university’s library for his help in offering me the resources in
researching and performing the program.
Lastly, the most special thanks go to my best partner and friend, my father, for
his help in collecting the data analysis and other helpful things. My gratitude
also goes to my mother. She gave me your unconditional support through all this
long process.

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Abstract
Although economic growth is higher in many countries, these nations still have
no increase or even suffering a depression in average national happiness. This
study has carefully examined the determinants of happiness or subject well-
being from literature. These determinants are divided into three main categories:
economic determinants, personal and demographic determinants and, finally,
social determinants. In addition to, some recent evidence reveal that happiness
also has the adverse significant effect on these factors and economic growth only
has restricted effects on happiness level of particular nations. In specific case,
based on 300 observations and ONS approach, this research paper desires to
estimate the magnitude of determinants of happiness in Binh Dinh province at
individual level. The results reveal that the mental, physical health, local
facilities satisfaction and household income have strong effects on individual’s
happiness level with high statistical significance. Furthermore, the size of
coefficients other several variables, including being a female, having partner,
high qualification, owned-house status, being employed or living in city is small
and ambiguous. It means that they have weak relationships with the happiness
level. Specifically, two variables of age and be employed, have opposed sign as
literature.
Keywords: Subject well-being, Happiness, Economic Growth, Life Satisfaction,
Determinants, Binh Dinh Province.

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Table of Contents
Acknowledgements.................................................................................................. ii
Abstract ................................................................................................................... iii
List of Tables .......................................................................................................... vi
List of Figures ........................................................................................................ vii
Abbreviations........................................................................................................ viii
Introduction.............................................................................................................. 1
Chapter One: Literature Review.......................................................................... 5
1.1. Happiness notation.........................................................................................5
1.1.1. Well-being concept................................................................................. 5
1.1.2. Object and subject well-being ................................................................ 6
1.1.3. Three dimensions theory ........................................................................ 7
1.1.4. Conceptual framework ......................................................................... 10
1.2. Determinants of Happiness ..........................................................................11
1.2.1 Happiness and Income........................................................................... 11
1.2.2 Happiness and Unemployment.............................................................. 19
1.2.3 Happiness and Inequality....................................................................... 23
1.2.4 Happiness and Demographic Determinants .......................................... 24
1.2.5. Happiness and Social Determinants ..................................................... 31
Chapter two: Socio-economic Overview of Binh Dinh province.................….33
2.1. Overview of Economics factors...................................................................33
2.2. Contribution to happiness at glance .............................................................34
2.3 Some remained obstructions .........................................................................37
Chapter Three: Methodology and Data............................................................. 39
3.1. Data ..............................................................................................................42
3.1.1 Data description..................................................................................... 42
3.1.2 The questionnaire design- ONS approach............................................. 42
3.2. Methodology ................................................................................................46

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3.2.1. Model specification .............................................................................. 46
3.2.2. The research detail function ................................................................. 44
3.2.3. Hypothesis statement............................................................................ 49
3.2.4. The description of variables use in this research.................................. 49
Chapter 4: Analysis result................................................................................... 53
4.1. The empirical analysis..................................................................................53
4.1.1. Multicolinearity test.............................................................................. 53
4.1.2. Heteroscedasticity test .......................................................................... 53
4.2. Analysis result..............................................................................................53
4.3. Analysis examination...................................................................................55
4.3. 1. Demographics determinants ................................................................ 55
4.2.2. Education and health determinants....................................................... 56
4.2.3. Economic and work determinants ........................................................ 58
4.2.4. Social life and community relationships determinants......................... 59
Chapter 5: Conclusion and ruture research directions.................................... 62
5.1. Conclusion and Recommendation................................................................62
5.2. Limitation and future research directions ....................................................65
APPENDICE ........................................................................................................ 53
Reference............................................................................................................... 73

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List of Tables
Table 1-The description of variables use in the thesis
Table 2 - Literature findings on determinants affecting happiness level
Table 3- Breusch-Pagan-Godfrey test result
Table 4- WLS and OLS analysis result
Table 5- Coefficients sign comparison

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List of Figures
Figure 1- Three dimensions of well-being
Figure 2- Conceptual framework
Figure 3- GDP per capita and happiness across regions
Figure 4- Happiness and Income in USA
Figure 5- Happiness and Income in Japan
Figure 6- Happiness and Income per Capita across Countries
Figure 7- Labor market status and Average subjective well-being ratings
Figure 8- Unemployment status and Average subjective well-being ratings
Figure 9- Marriage status and Average life satisfaction ratings
Figure 10- Average life satisfaction ratings of the number of children between
different gender respondents.
Figure 11- Average Happiness and Age through a life cycle
Figure 12- Gender and Average subjective well-being ratings

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Abbreviations
APS: Annual Population Survey
ATUS: Annual Time-Use Survey
BHPS: British Household Panel Survey
BSPS: British Society for the Philosophy of Science
DEFRA: Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
DHS: Dutch Household Survey
ECHP: European Community Household Panel
EMA: Ecological Momentary Assessment
ESM: Experience Sampling Method
ESS: European Social Survey
ERD: Responsible Development Environment
FSU: Former Soviet Union
GDP: Gross Domestic Product
GNH: General National Happiness
GNP: Gross National Product
GSS: General Social Survey
HIV/AIDS: Human Immunodeficiency Virus/ Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome
Hukou: Household Registration Identity
IHS: Institute of Human Studies
NEF: New Economic Foundation
NEW: Net Economic Benefits

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ONS: Office for National Statistics
PANAS: Positive and Negative Affect Scale
UK: United Kingdom
SWB: Subject well-being
WVS: World Values Survey
WEF World Economic Forum

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Introduction
In recent years, a European debt crisis as well as the global economic crisis has set
for us the question: Whether the targets which countries following are
appropriate? And was it time the world needs a new goal?
The world economy has long been using the concept of Gross Domestic Product
(GDP) is the standard to evaluate the prosperity of a country. This standard often
does not include the costs to achieve progress society and the environment.
While the rest of the world is playing with the global recession storm, there is a
small Buddhist nation that situate on the top of steep Himalayan snow for
thousand years and that has boldly claimed to have found the solution for the
question the true happiness in where and the objective a nation should pursue?
Bhutan Government initiates to uses the standard "General National Happiness"
(GNH) with GDP as the standard to evaluate the prosperity of each country. The
nations of the world should probably learn to imitate wings of Bhutan to evaluate
the effectiveness of the policy agenda on the basis that it brings happiness to the
people rather than the economic growth figures for insensitivity. Gross National
Happiness value (Gross National Happiness - GNH) was born from the ideas of
former King of Bhutan, Sir Wangchuck (Alejandro, 2009), is applied from the
1970s to replace the concept of Gross national product (GNP). He did not hesitate
to say "no" before the globalization efforts of the West with his famous phrase:
"The total national happiness (GNH) is more important than gross national product
(GDP)". As a small country in the Himalayas with about 708,427 people and is
one of the poorest countries. However, based on GNH, Bhutan's GNH probably is
the top in the world. Kinley Dorji (1972), secretary of contact information for
Bhutan: "Just look at the indicators of economic growth will lead to where they
know," he said, referring to the economic downturn worldwide. "The

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industrialized countries must have realized now that GNP is a broken promise
alone.
In addition to Bhutan, this criterion has much more paid national attention in some
other countries. Costa Rica strongly supports to the "responsible development
environment” (ERD), while the United Kingdom proposed for "welfare state". In
contrary, as the Bhutan’s neighbor- China is a notable opposite.
After two decades of economic growth in an extraordinary way, the Chinese are
not significantly happier than ever before, according to a study evaluating the level
of happiness and national income in the economy's fastest growing world.
Looking at the overview, the rich in China is little happier than before, but those
with the average income level the degree of happiness does not seem to change
anything. As for the poor, the satisfaction level of life seems to drop significantly.
These trends are not grounds for criticizing the capitalist economy, or economic
growth - but they were somewhat suggests that the conventional economic criteria
are not strong sufficient enough to measure happiness evaluation.
Easterlin (1974), an economist from the University of Southern California, became
famous after his paper published in 1974 which confirms that money can help
people happier, but only to a certain extent. After you satisfy certain basic needs,
the degree of satisfaction with life will increase with decreasing income. Known
as Easterlin paradox, this issue is a compelling illustration for the application of
scientific methods to solve the question of sociology and economics.
Binh Dinh province is similar to the most of other locations of Vietnam. It usually
uses GDP or GNP as the ultimate target to pursuit. Moreover, as tracking this goal,
Binh Dinh could devote numerous valuable things and can be easily involved into
World economy crisis. For instance, when the World economic crisis in 2007
blooms, the Binh Dinh province economy has suffered a severe consequence with
the significant decrease in the economic growth rate, substantially contracting in
Bank credit ability, negative effects on import- export activities…. (Annual

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economic report of People's Committee of Binh Dinh Province, 2008). This
consequence, straightforward state, is strongly correlated with flaws in the GDP
indicator as an appropriate measure of human’s well-being.
This research going to provide some guides for future choices of policy-makers to
help them performing the best policies in order to improving society’s well-being
in general. Moreover, it also introduces a new perception of “progression” and
helps us do not fall into the “economic development trap” like China are suffering.
The major objective of this study is to investigate the happiness from the
knowledge which pieced out from the newest achievement of literature, the
common determinants and the suitable measure of happiness as well as reveals the
result as estimate determinants of happiness in Binh Dinh province.
This study tries to answer the main questions:
What are the determinants of happiness in Binh Dinh Province?
The research presents reviews of economic theories that directly relate to the
research topics then make clear two problems:
+ What are determinants of happiness and the relationship between
economic growth and happiness?
+ What is the suitable approach to evaluate happiness and limitation on the
use of happiness indicators?
Finally, this study also assesses some relevant determinants affecting to happiness
then answer the main question. In this research, the expectation of these
determinants has significant effect to the certain level of happiness of Binh Dinh
province.
This paper outline consists of five chapters; after introduction is literature review
section generally, the next is to review the happiness, subjects of well-being
concepts and determinants of happiness. Third section exhibits sources of data and

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methodology using in paper. The next section reveals empirical result and carries
out explanation on this result. As a conclusion, final section comments upon the
result then give important implication on practice.

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Chapter One
Literature Review
The concept of subject well-being or happiness is a social science notation. It is
receiving much more attention today, both in policy-oriented analysis and
academic research before making any potential research on this field to meet the
study purposes it is critical to clarify some ideas about them. This chapter presents
literature review, at first, it explores what is subject well-being or happiness, then,
figures out which determinants could affect to individual’s happiness level and
how they are significant. Finally, in this chapter, it also introduces some
appropriate measures of these variables.
1.1. Happiness notation
1.1.1. Well-being concept
The first concept relating to happiness is well-being. While intuitively attractions,
the notation of well-being is especially difficult to define clearly. In general, well-
being comes from being attached, put on and trapped in a net of interests and
relationships giving means to our lives. The familiarity, belongings and supports
provided by close personal relationships seem to be the most important and
isolation imposes the highest bothersome (Eckersley, 2004). In another study
presenting to give a formulation of well-being definition, Nic Marks’ study (2007)
has conceptualized well-being into a famous statement: ‘Doing well - feeling
good’ and “doing good - feeling well”. It is a likely famous formulation for well-
being which obtaining the dual aspect of well-being noted above.
‘Doing-well’ expresses the material or the objective dimension of one’s welfare or
standard of living, suggesting economic prosperity groundwork. In another side,
‘feeling-good’ phrase reveals the ‘subjective dimension’ of personal perceptions
and this is called as one’s happiness level or satisfaction. The next term, ‘doing

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good-feeling well’, exposes the evidence for this paper’s claims which are
specially found in developing countries. This is obviously that the moral
dimension frequently includes a religious expression or beliefs, cultural and social
characteristics were also extremely important to human life. Hence, well-being is
not just about ‘the good life,’ but about ‘living a good life.’ This concept want to
concern not just individual preferences, but the core values is deeper, showing
understanding of how the world is and should be. Nonetheless, it also goes beyond
this notation when again affirm the importance of moral sense about feeling at
ease with one’s place in the world – which is critically associated with how one is
in relationship to others (White, 2008).
1.1.2. Object and subject well-being
According to Conceição and Bandura, (2008), well-being concept could be
divided into two different approaches: subjective and objective approaches. In the
first approach, well-being is measured through certain observable evidence such as
social, economic and environmental statistics or indices in which one’s well-being
is valuated indirectly by using cardinal measures. In other aspect, objective well-
being relies mostly on assumptions about human needs and rights. Traditionally,
well-being often has been measured with a single objective dimension: material
well-being measured by income, income per capita GDP, GNP or so on. It then
reconciles and uses multidimensional well-being measures such as constructing
objective measures to complement GDP, for example, doing addition
environmental and social calculations beyond the economic stance (Sumner, 2006;
McGillivray, 2007) or monetizing different demeanors that are not computed in
the GDP measurement, such as, environmental and social aspects (McGillivray,
2007). The objective approach, however, has many limitations. For instance, the
approach requires researchers must decide which indicators are most important for
assessing and monitoring the well-being of a national level prior to any judgment
can be introduced.

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In the other hand, subjective measures of well-being capture people’s real
experiences or feelings in the most direct way, of estimating well-being through
ordinal measures. Comparing to the objective approach, the subjective well-being
(SWB) has the advantage that it can avoid the need for a priori assumptions about
what constitutes a good life and also overcome the aspect of paternalism
(assumptions about what adds and detracts from individuals well-being) (Waldron,
2010). This is due to the fact that it asks individuals about their views on their own
well-being and allows them to make their own assessment of their well-being.
1.1.3. Three dimensions theory
White gives another approach to measuring well-being. The paper claimed that:”
A category of ‘objective’ is hard to justify if the concept of well-being is to be
person-centered, since all persons, including officials and academics, see and
speak from a particular place, none has an un-biased, universal vision”(2008, p.17).
Moreover, understandings of well-being are mainly constructed in particular social
and cultural framework. It means there is no ‘pure objective’ could be existed
outside of a certain society or culture, which can be declared separately to people’s
‘subjective’. This idea does not mean to eliminate the importance of the material
or physical effects. Standard of living and material welfare are clearly critical
elements to any notion of well-being and the material and intangible; need to be
aware as intrinsically intertwined. Sen (1991) has supported the view that
happiness as an important thing of people life but there are various aspects of life
that should come first because of their important, such as justice, rights, security
and freedom.
According to WeD (2008) approach, White has introduced “three dimensions of
well-being” model.

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Figure 1- Three dimensions of well-being
Source: White S.C., (2008): But what is well-being? A framework for analysis in social and development
policy and practice. WeD working (p) 17.
The image of the triangle exhibits some remarkable characteristics of the
relationship between three components of well-being. At first, this image reveals
that three elements have certain relationship and interdependence of the various
elements, without existence of others none could exist. The second, the
“subjective” dimension position in this figure purposely exhibits that the “subject”
firstly is forming on a socially and culturally ground dimensions of well-being. In
practice, however, the relative importance of these dimensions will change over
time depending on the context of discussion and the priorities of the readers
concerned. After all, a critical thing regarding this figure is that the three
dimensions of well-being identified here likely have interaction with other more
than established discussions and in some case they are almost similar.
With each concept, the explanation could be simply perceptible. At first, the
material dimensions of well-being mention real objects which directly construct
‘capabilities’ or ‘human capital’ such as health and education, with others
identified as material, natural, physical, financial capital and assets. Alongside
matters that people could own or have called ‘common property resources’, there
are some items that the people can use for building their ‘capabilities’ but they
must share with other such as the physical and natural environment. In other
Subject
Rational Material

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aspect, the relational dimensions of well-being consist of intimate relations such as
the couple love and the caring from relatives. They also are influenced by the
classic ‘social capital’ components of social organizations such as labor-union,
women-union, trade-union… as well as interactions with local governors and their
services, for example, policies, the law, national or local politics, social security
and welfare services.
Finally, the subjective dimensions of well-being concern what people conceive
and value to be good, how they feel about their lives and the desires they confirm
and pursuit for their whole life . This dimension is the most ingredients composing
individual happiness. However, it still relatively depends on previous dimensions.
As Prinz and Bünger (2012) commented that people, first of all, must meet their
basic needs, whatever less time is necessary to meet basic needs, their time
constraints may be reduced. It means that people becoming more productive, and
this implies that they also become richer than before. Thus, more time can be
devoted to achieving happiness and increasing welfare.
In reality, SWB, life satisfaction and happiness can used interchangeably but in
psychology, the concept of happiness is narrower than SWB and far different from
life satisfaction. According to psychologists, both life satisfaction and happiness
are components of SWB; they still have slight difference between two notions.
The life satisfaction expresses one’s received distance from their expectations
while happiness concept comes from how an individual equilibrate between the
negative affect and positive.
In this context, SWB seem to be similar to “being happy”, in a contrary, concepts
such as “satisfaction” and “happiness” are considered “feeling happy”. Despite
economists have interchangeably used the terms “happiness” and “life
satisfaction” for a long time as measuring of subjective well-being (Easterlin,
2004), there is still no obvious agreement on what “happiness” really refer to. In

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practice, however, we can use SWB data to measure happiness or life satisfaction
due to the similar meaning in measuring these indicators.
1.1.4. Conceptual framework
From the literature review and purpose of this study, a conceptual framework can
be drawn as diagram below (Figure 2). This figure mainly describes the
relationship among three groups of factors (material, demography and social
determinants) to happiness or SWB as a three-dimension approach.
Figure 2- Conceptual Framework
Source: Author’ synthesis
Material
 Income
 Employment
Social
 Political situation
 Freedom level
 Social capital and quality
of institutions
Demographic
 Physical and mental
health
 Family Life
 Age
 Gender
Happiness or SWB

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1.2. Determinants of Happiness
1.2.1. Income and happiness
What is the relationship between economic growth and happiness then
improvement in personal income? Economic growth related to the increase in real
national income per capita, meaning that the value of services and goods
manufactured per capita in an economy after inflation adjustment played.
Economic growth is a necessary to improve the living standards of the masses in
countries with a low GDP per capita level. It is necessary, because without growth,
the individual can only be better off through the transfer of income and assets from
others. In a poor country, even if a fraction of the population is very rich, the
potential for redistribution of such type is very limited.
1.2.1.1. The relationship between happiness and income
It has given robust evidence that GDP is an appropriate indicator reflecting the
happiness level of nations. The relationship between economic growth and
happiness is most critical relationship which many economists are interested in
studying happiness. Whether richer countries can “fell” happier than poorer ones?
This relationship is early introduced in neoclassical theory. Under traditional
utility function framework, neoclassical economists assumed that with more
choices or more consumption people can maximize their utility and then get higher
happiness. Nevertheless, many overviews of the empirical and theoretical
literature on income and happiness in most recent studies exhibit more complex
range of observed behaviors.
Numerous investigations deal with the relationship between economic variables
and happiness. The general findings also set out some evidence on strongly
relationship between GDP and happiness of residents in many regions (Figure 3).

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Figure 3- GDP per capita and happiness across regions
Soure: Graham C. and Pettinato S., 2002. Happiness and Hardship: Opportunity and Insecurity in New
Market Economies
There are two basic measurements of national income being often used quite
popular. The total national product (GNP) is the total value of goods and services
ultimately produced in society in a year. GNP does not include intermediate goods
which used in the process of producing other goods, such as engine in automotive
or processors in a computer). GNP is output produced by a country's inhabitant,
adding the value of goods and services produced by residents living outside the
country's borders. GNP is one of the most common indicators used in national
income accounting. Steve and John (1997) and other multilateral organizations
often refer this concept as the total national income (GNI).Total domestic product
(GDP) is up to the total output produced within the country's borders, including
the output produced by residents’ foreigners, but not the output value of citizens
living outside the country. Get the GNP or GDP divided by the total population is
one measure of income that we can illustrate the difference between nations.
Moreover, GDP is also a measure of total output and total income. This statement
can be investigate via ‘value added’ notion, ‘value added’ is the increased revenue
at a particular stage of production corresponded to the price of this good.

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Therefore, the total value added in all steps of production match to total
production.
Although, GDP or GNP is the good indicator to assess the nations’ welfare, there
are some serious problems which should be concerned (failing in measure
untradeable good or “bad” things or the problems with equivalent exchange rates).
1.2.1.2. Easterlin Paradox or diminishing marginal utility rule of happiness
The first and famous finding which has discovered by Easterlin (1974) showed
that the relationship between happiness and income was presented by curvilinear
shape and especially less steep at higher income. This phenomenon reflexes the
diminishing return to increases in individual consumption and that are normally
consistent with theoretical utility functions. Therefore, in the research, researcher
has investigated an apparent evidence of a positive effect of income on happiness
at the individual level. This finding is like to the assumptions of standard
economic theory regardless to the findings of objective measures of quality of life
(Easterlin, 1974). Moreover, by redoing this research on US data and other
developed data, Easterlin also reached the same conclusion (Easterlin, 1995; Frey
and Stutzer, 2002; Blanchflower and Oswald, 2000) that aggregate national
happiness was especially flat in most developed countries over time, the individual
happiness level in this case seem keep a lower speech with a sustained increases in
GDP per capita in USA (Figure 4).

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Figure 4- Happiness and Income in USA
Source: World Database of Happiness, US Department of Commerce, Census Bureau, 2000
This observation is often called as ‘Easterlin Paradox’ and can be stated that a
growth of per capita income is not reflected in increasing happiness. However, in a
counterpart, the case of Japan is often used in the literature as an opposite story of
the whole picture. This finding partly counters the hypothesis that a country’s
happiness increases as a country go from a developing country to high income
country. From literature, Japan is an unusual case of a country for which long-term
happiness data is available; the data has drawn an interesting picture, Japanese’s
GDP per capita was below $3,000 from the late 1950s and rose more than five-
fold from 1958 to 1991 without any significant growth in reported happiness level
(Easterlin, 1995) (Figure 5).

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Figure 5- Happiness and Income in USA in Japan
Source: Easterlin R., 1995. Will Raising the Incomes of All Increase the Happiness of All?
The Easterlin paradox can be clarified by many ways. The first, from classical
economists’ point of view, these individual benefits model could demonstrate the
positive slope found in much of the empirical literature. Nevertheless, as
performance in the diminishing marginal utility rule, when people consume more
with higher income their benefit approaches zero and individual happiness level in
developed countries are smoother.
Another explanation was introduced by Mathias Binswanger (2006) about
treadmill behind paradox of income. He claimed that in developed countries where
people try to walk faster and faster in the street to get a higher income then higher
consumption and happiness but the fact indicates that the growth seems not to
improve their current happiness situation. Generally speak, happiness almost
unchanged, no matter how fast people are walking on the treadmills. The study
showed that reported levels of happiness of observations do not rise corresponds
with income levels, and people are experiencing unhappiness more and more time.
This paper presented four treadmills underlying this paradox of happiness. There
are the positional treadmill, the hedonic treadmill, the time-saving treadmill and

25. 16
the multi-option treadmill, they are all seem to make a significant denotation to
stagnancy of one’s happiness. The hedonic treadmill and positional treadmill both
describes how people keep happiness from rising along with income by regulating
their aspirations in particular status. In a different way, the multi-option treadmill
explains why people’s happiness does not increase beyond a certain threshold
level. With more options, they must spend more time and money, and then time
for relaxing and enjoying also reduced make people’s happiness go down in line.
Finally, the time-saving treadmill investigates the fact that time-saving
technological progress fails to eliminate time pressure in people’s life.
There are many economists powerfully supporting this point of view. Caporale,
Georgellis, Tsitsianis and Yin (2009) reveal robust evidence which mainly assists
a positional treadmill. By using cross-sectional data from the European Social
Survey (ESS), it explores the relationship between happiness and income, relative
income across 19 European countries. The result point out a positive, statistically
significant relationship between happiness and income does exist, but such a
relationship is debilitated by relative income. The evidence, in the case of Western
European countries, also investigates that while relative income puts forth a
negative impact on happiness, however, it gives out a positive effect in the case of
the Eastern European countries. This finding is consistent with the ‘tunnel effect’
hypothesis. The ‘tunnel effect’ say that an increasing income gap between the poor
and rich lessens well-being due to social comparisons or if the poor looks for
higher income in future due to the fact that inequality rising during rapid growth at
the early stages of reforms then inequality becomes politically and socially more
acceptable. Hence, in both case eliminating income inequality should be paid more
attention in policy agenda. This suggests that relative income affects their prospect
about future economic prospects rather than a criterion measure for social
inequality.

26. 17
Veenhoven (1991) and Inglehart (2000) using cross-country evidence stated that
the happiness and income relationship is curvilinear with one important point
called ‘threshold’. With all point stays below this point, income per capita has
strong relationship with happiness but from then onwards, levels of happiness are
very weakly correlated with further expansions in income per capita (Figure 6).
Figure 6- Happiness and Income per Capita across Countries
Source: Inglehart and Klingemann (2000), Globalization and Postmodern Values. The Washington
Quarterly, 23 (1), p. 215-228.
This “threshold” hypothesis states that above a certain level of GDP, income has
very weak effect on happiness. The position states that income improves happiness
only when people are not satisfying their basic human needs (Maslow’s pyramid
of needs, 1943). But beyond ‘threshold’, as their basic needs are fulfilled, income
does not matter for happiness. Inglehart (2000) also added some evidences to
prove this idea; it showed that societies must expend a high cost at early stages of
development. Nevertheless, whenever their basic needs are satisfied, step by step,
the components of better quality of their life will turn into another thing such as
higher security, better environment or full house (Clark, Paul and Shields 2007).
Hence, under this theory, the relationship between happiness and income is
curvilinear.

27. 18
Moreover, other arguments continuously are exhibited by many economists about
this curvilinear relationship. Layard, Nickell and Mayraz (2008) have concluded
that the marginal utility of income declines a little bit faster than in proportion to
the increase in income by estimating the data cover over fifty countries and time
periods from 1972 to 2005. In the research, through six different surveys under a
number of assumptions, the estimate the elasticity of marginal utility with respect
to income is able to estimate. The outcome in each survey as well as subgroups in
the population is likely similar with the lowest, highest absolute value and a
combined estimate are approximately 1.2, 1.35 and 1.26 correspondently.
In the research of Deaton (2008a, 2008b), he has investigated an interesting
discovery when using cross-country data from countries in the Former Soviet
Union (FSU) to estimating the relationship between happiness and income. The
evidence points out that there are many outliers. Even though economic conditions
have improved in FSU countries (they are in the world's 20 fastest-growing
economies between 2000 and 2003), they still report much lower levels of
subjective well-being and life satisfaction than poorer countries, such as Nigeria
and India, in a same point in time. He finds that “low satisfaction ratings from
high-growth countries for across the 132 nations studied and income growth is
negatively related to life satisfaction” (Deaton 2008a). Finally, in another research
(Deaton 2008b) claims that the correlation between income and life satisfaction is
very high and remains substantial and positive, even among rich countries.
Another argument was exposed by Stevenson and Wolfers (2008). With more data
has become available, more extending multiple datasets such as extended national
time series and additional observations from new countries in many years and a
broader array of countries, he set his wits to a question of the Easterlin Paradox.
The study outcome is also associated with earlier findings and it also discovers
that the poorer societies are less happy than wealthier societies; it is also true for
the case of wealthier and poorer members of a same given country. Moreover, the

28. 19
research’s result also confirms that societies get happier over time as they become
richer. However, this conclusion just true for the case of Europe while the case of
the U.S. remains a puzzle.
In the time series data for a country or individual, the relationship between
happiness and income is consistent with state that they have positive significant at
low level of income but weak relationship with higher income then express the
diminishing rule of happiness.
In general, however, economic growth is necessary but not sufficient to improve
the general living standards. It would be wrong to assume that per capita GDP
higher means more income for everyone, or even for the majority of households,
at least three reasons, First, governments promote economic growth not only to
promote the welfare of their nation which is sometimes mainly to gain power and
glory of the state and the rulers.
Economic growth is included in the expensive project like this; it often brings little
benefit to the public. Second, resources can be massive investment for further
growth, and consumer interests to be delayed one day later. Third, income and
consumption may increase, but the inherently relatively better off may get all or
most benefits.
1.2.2. Unemployment and Happiness
Apart from income, many macroeconomic variables such as unemployment and
business cycles are also investigated in relationship with happiness through many
studies.
On the happiness and unemployment aspect, there are many researches which
have used various kinds of data to find out the effect of unemployment to
happiness precisely.
Studies have clearly investigated that person who is experiencing unemployment
makes them very unhappy for many various countries and time periods. Moreover,

29. 20
unemployment situation of society also causes a negative effect on people, even if
they themselves still are working. In this case, people may feel unhappy because
of the unfortunate kismet of the people who are put out of work as well as they
may worry about their future of being unemployed. This conclusion is supported
by analysis of the Annual Population Survey (APS) data (ONS, 2011). According
to the research, average ratings for the ‘worthwhile’, ‘happy’ and ‘life satisfaction’
questions were clearly higher for employed than for unemployed people, as shown
in Figure 7.
Figure 7- Labor market status and Average subjective well-being ratings
Source: Office for National Statistics -Annual Population Survey (APS) (2011)
Dolan et al., (2010) also has been suggested that the effect of unemployment
situation is slightly different for two groups: male and female. Men seem suffer
more negative effect in subjective well-being than on women’s. APS data shows
that lower average ratings for the ‘worthwhile’, ‘happy’ and ‘life satisfaction’
questions associate with people who endure longer times of unemployment
(Figure 8).

30. 21
Figure 8- Unemployment status and Average subjective well-being ratings
Source: Office for National Statistics -Annual Population Survey (APS) (2011)
Clark (2008), by the same token, using pooled cross-section of two subgroups:
British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) and European Community Household
Panel (ECHP), has declared that longer duration unemployment is mostly just as
bad as shorter duration unemployment with both bivariate and multivariate results.
According to Di Tella and MacCulloch (2006), as investigating the effect of
inflation on happiness, has found that higher rate of both unemployment and
inflation has caused a deduction in one’s social welfare. The primary critique for
this issue is that nominal aspects of an economy like inflation should not affect to
rational people (Di Tella and MacCulloch, 2006). However, from the latest
evidence, this critique likely is eliminated by affirmation that inflation as well as
unemployment significantly reduces people’s happiness.
Inflation not only corrodes purchasing power but also creates a negative emotion
of reduced national reputation and people’s confidence (Di Tella and MacCulloch
2008). Spiritual lost caused by unemployment, aside from the monetary loss, is
involved with costs such as depression, anxiety, loss of self-reverence (Frey and
Stutzer, 2002). Comparing the trade-off between inflation and unemployment in

31. 22
terms of happiness, the study found that inflation affects happiness less than
unemployment, adverting to the “misery index”, which was used frequently in
literature, and which has misshaped the real picture.
Di Tella, MacCulloch and Oswald (2001) by using data of citizens from twelve
European countries and from the General Social Survey (GSS) of United States,
have investigated that a simple linear misery function is not enough to express a
true relationship between unemployment, inflation and happiness. In this case, a
curve may be the best choice. The paper exhibits a systematically moving
between how happy individuals feel and their country’s level of inflation and
unemployment. These indexes exhibit how one’s happiness level varies when the
national unemployment or inflation rate change 1 percent. The authors also
presented some interesting calculation to prove that unemployment creates more
unhappiness than inflation. According to his calculation, a percentage point of
inflation creates approximately 1.7 times less unhappiness than a percentage point
of unemployment. By the same token, Wolfers (2003) also reinforces and enhance
this conclusion by using a larger sample than former research and the
disagreement is only in magnitude. His estimates reveal that the public seems to
be more hostile to unemployment than in former calculation, particularly, the
trade-off between unemployment and inflation close to fivefold not just 1.7 times.
Researching how inflation and unemployment affect happiness can give
policymakers a benchmark as giving out some important policies because these
policies can affect people in another way in terms of reduced happiness.
Fumio Ohtake (2012) in research about unemployment and happiness based on
data collected in Japan has expressed the same view with the others. This
conclusion suggests that creating jobs rather than redistributing wealth to the
unemployed may effectively improve people’s levels of happiness under the
budget constraint situation.

32. 23
In summary, most evidence supports the negative relationship between
unemployment, inflation and happiness. Disagreement is only reserved on scale of
unemployment, inflation on happiness or differences among subgroups on a
specific time period.
1.2.3. Inequality and Happiness
In literature, the negative relationship between happiness and inequality seem
widely acceptable.
Di Tella et al (2001, 2003) based on numerous answers has found that there is a
large and significant negative effect of inequality on happiness in Europe but not
in the U.S. The differences in happiness level are significantly observed across
groups for inequality. Some groups in Europe, the poor might suffer a higher
unhappiness temper from inequality. Contrariwise, in the United States
unhappiness is only observed from the rich. Why the contrary could happen for
two groups which they seem have the same economic condition? There are many
explanations could be adapted, firstly, the reason comes from the “style” of the
society where the individuals are living. Americans have been living in a mobile
society where individual efforts are strongly encouraged and with their attempt,
they may easily improve their social position while Europeans recognized that
they are living in rather immobile societies. In the next, but less favored than
former, the Europeans may be prefer equal societies than the Americans.
Therefore, it is reasonable to confirm the hypothesis that social mobility status,
which people are living, could affects one’s perceived happiness differently
though they are in the same group.
Graham and Pettinato (2002) analyzed subjective well-being in 17 Russia and
Latin American countries. The research has discovered that relative income
differences have important effects on happiness which they can sense. This
research shows that poorest groups are more likely to receive a satisfactory than
those who are living in the middle or lower middle of the income.

33. 24
However, Shiqing Jiang, Ming Lu and Hiroshi Sato (2012) present a different
story relating to impact of income inequality on happiness. This study said that
people feel unhappy with between-group inequality, as measured by the income
gap between urban residents. However, the result also suggests that income gap or
inequality between urban residents and migrants regardless whether or not they
have local hukou, (household registration identity), is positively correlates with
happiness. The explanation for this vague conclusion could be drawn on
experience that the higher inequality the stronger incentive to work and more
happiness. The contribution of the study to happiness literature is the distinction of
general inequality and between-group inequality on happiness.
1.2.4 Demographic Determinants
Demographic characteristics seem too hard to attract attention of researchers on
economics standpoint. However, it is the most important source of SWB from the
view of psychologists. Demographics might be relevant in psychology and
influences generally on SWB. Therefore, it should be involved in and controlled in
regression analysis.
In psychology, ‘set-point theory’ has stated that each individual has a fixed set-
point of life satisfaction or happiness specified by personality and genetics. Some
events happening through their life, which have critical effects to one’s life
experience such as marriage or divorce, having child or serious injury may
temporarily diverse a person above or below the balance status. However,
according to ‘set-point theory’, each individual will accommodate their temper
before new circumstances, and then revert to the starting point. The process is
called ‘hedonic adaptation’ by psychologists (Easterlin, 2004). In reality, it may be
appropriate for the changing in individual income. A person can reverse to their
set-point of happiness after a ‘completely adaption’ to new circumstances.
According to Easterlin, however, argues that the hedonic adaption assumption is
not completely correct for all circumstances. Individual happiness level might be

34. 25
varied forever, in other word; new set-point is constructed with serious life events
such as marriage, divorce, and disease or serious disability.
1.2.4.1 Health
There are two arguments on connection between health and happiness. According
to “set-point” theory, people who suffer a major disease or serious accident may
fully recover from such circumstances with the support of up-to-date medications,
a good health-care services and, especially, with a promotion from their relatives
or friends.
Brickman, Coates and Bulman (1978) repeatedly tried to find in their study an
evidence of complete adaptation. However, the result still is ambiguous, this study
claimed that there are not “expected” differences between the group experiencing
serious disabilities with the nondisabled group. In another hand, it is not absolutely
confirms that have not significant deference in happiness of two groups. In the end,
this “fully adaption” assumption continue be argued in literature.
Easterlin (2003, 2004) gives conclusion that an adverse change in health
permanently reduces happiness. In his study, he observed that people who were
not disabilities significantly report a higher life satisfaction or happiness than
those who were. The more straightforward conclusion is that the worse the change
in health, the greater the deduction in happiness. Of course, this research does not
concern to the time needed for adaption fully performed or refers that no
adaptation for disability. It seems clear from comprehensive survey evidence that
adverse health changes cause a negative effect on happiness but it could not be
fully adapted.
Easterlin (2003) also gives an exception on relationships of age, health and
happiness. When people get older the real health problems increase as people age.
If adaption is performed completely with the adverse changes in health the self-
reported health over the life circle should not be changed. The answer, however,

35. 26
contradict to expectation that self-reported health not declines throughout the life
course. This findings notice us be careful as applying this theory in the research,
the problem with health caused by age may be entirely adapted.
In other side, Deaton (2008b) warned that not using health satisfaction measures
as indicators of well-being in international comparisons. His paper reveals that
health satisfaction is quite low in the countries of the former Soviet Union and
Eastern Europe, which life-expectancy declines remarkable recently. In opposite,
for countries in Africa, people in those countries do not express the same levels of
dissatisfaction with their health as in the FSU and Eastern Europe though the
HIV/AIDS epidemic make a significant declines in their life-expectancy.
Some recent studies add more advantaged information on happiness study by
giving a robust evidence of adverse happiness effect on future health. According
to psychologists, a stability in happiness levels over time lead to an improvement
in people’s health both subjectively and objectively positive. People in this context
might experience a cognitive bias such as optimism, self-esteem, and control. In
the Russian context, Graham, Eggers and Sukhtankar (2004) also supported for
this idea.
1.2.4.2 Family Life
Almost studies have agreed on the conclusion that marriage has important impact
on happiness across countries, in this case, is positive impact. Married people have
reported a higher happiness than separated, divorced, singles or widowed. Diener
et al (2000) reveals the relationship between marital status and SWB be very
similar across 42 countries, regarding all cultural aspects. Blanchflower and
Oswald (2000) monetized a lasting marriage is worth one thousand dollar per
annum comparing to those has widowed or separated. Heliwell (2003) also
support this view that married people have higher levels of happiness than
unmarried people. The APS statistics (ONS, 2011) as comparing life satisfaction
among group people has concluded that the married has reported the highest

36. 27
average levels of life significantly higher than, single and widowed people and the
lowest average rating was reported by those who are separated or divorced
(Figure 9).
Figure 9- Marriage status and Average life satisfaction ratings
Source: Office for National Statistics -Annual Population Survey (APS) (2011)
Why married people have higher SWB than other ones? According to Frey and
Stutzer (2002) explain that marriage improves the spiritual status of involvers as
well as give additional material support and partnership.
Easterlin (2005a) further supported this point in a new study with different
explanation. The results claim that the people who are single, widow or divorce
report lower happiness level than married people because they do not fully adapt
these circumstances to their life. If they adapted to their circumstances fully, a
happy marriage would not be desired. He also concludes that a remarriage creates
a similar happiness as in their first marriage, and persons who remarry still get a
significantly greater happiness than their unmarried counterparts even many years
later. This result, however, contradicts Blanchflower and Oswald finding that
second marriages are less happy than the first. On the causality aspect, people who
do not feel happier in marriage still not likely to divorce. (Graham, Eggers and
Sukhtankar, 2011)

37. 28
One special aspect in family life is the quantity of children, for which Easterlin
(2005a) investigated the received utility in terms of quantity of children. In
literature, many economists expect to be able to applying the consumption theory
as well as using demand function in order to estimate demand for children in a.
This result, however, suggests that growth in desires for either the number or
quality of children is seemingly not associated with growth in SWB.
Interestingly, the happiness level reported for people who live in households
without children and people who live in households with more than one child was
no significant difference. This feeling is the same for both man and woman except
the case when their family has more than five children (Figure 10).
Figure 10- Average life satisfaction ratings of the number of children between
different gender respondents
Source: Office for National Statistics -Annual Population Survey (APS) (2011)
1.2.4.3. Age
At the beginning, people likely believe that younger people are happier than elder
people due to less mobility, heath or money. Moreover, almost recent happiness
researches agree on U-shaped of happiness diagram through a life circle (Figure
11).

38. 29
Figure 11- Average Happiness and Age through a life cycle
Source: Arthur Stone (2010). A Snapshot of the age distribution of psychological well-being in the United
States. PNAS paper.
Studies based on large sample sizes have revealed that on average, both elder and
younger age groups informed a higher happiness and the lower levels of happiness
fall to the middle age groups. In general, the happiness level increase a bit as
people age shift from age of 18 to 37 and fall into a decline thereafter until reach
the age of 53 the happiness level rising again (Blanchflower 2008; Blanchflower
and Oswald 2007a; Oswald 1997; Helliwell 2003). Sam Waldron (2010) also
strongly supported this point of view but the minimum and peaks; the only
significant difference between the minimum and peaks in various researches
comes from using different SWB scale in various studies.
This pattern in the reported happiness trends come from net effect of various life
domains such as their health situation, financial, work status and family life
through life circle. In most cases, the people who are in midlife have a minor
improvement in their happiness level thank to the net effect of growing happiness
with one’s work, social relationships and family life…this improvement may
compensate deducing happiness with health. Afterward, the net effect seem more
serious or the happiness level is fall rapidly along with diminishing satisfaction
with one’s family situation and work as well as their both mental and physical

39. 30
health. However, with some people, their better financial situation seems enough
to compensate these negative trends caused by their age (Easterlin, 2006).
1.2.4.4. Gender
In literature, gender variable is regarded as an exciting situation and paid more
attention on it through many studies.
Sam Waldron (2010) on his working paper, employing the large sample from the
APS, has found out that the men and women do not have the same happiness level
in most cases although the differences in average were fairly small with
statistically significant between two groups although Figure 12 shows that men
have represented totally lower average ratings than women for the for the ‘happy’
question, ‘worthwhile’ and ‘life satisfaction’ questions in most case. Nevertheless,
men also have represented significantly lower anxiety levels than women.
Figure 12- Gender and Average subjective well-being ratings
Source: Office for National -Statistics Annual Population Survey (APS) (2011)
As the same result, Mookerjee and Beron (2005) give a further comment on
gender, and happiness. The results reveal that gender has strong impact to
individual happiness level. The outcome is intensified by some examples of the
percentage of women in labor force, parliament, how they are behave in their

40. 31
company… both of them significantly have important impact on the degree of
happiness.
1.2.5. Social Determinants
There is an evidence reveals that how performance of government’s institutions
highly related with happiness. The extent of economic and political regulations in
order to improve personal freedom is positively correlated with happiness level
(Frey and Stutzer, 2002). A progress democracy also contributes a higher
happiness to people along with achievements in social and natural sciences.
Moreover, evidence from large Switzerland sample shows that the government
decentralization associated with development in the institutions help people
happier in these locations (Frey and Stutzer, 2000).
Veenhoven (2003) has tried to find out whether freedom in nations could influence
the residents happiness. The research reveals that freedom does not always
generate the same happiness for all people living in the same society then
approximately having the same freedom. He proves that freedom is positively
correlated to happiness among rich countries but it is meaningless for poor
countries. In additional, freedom not just is concerned as personal freedom, it is
considered as an economic freedom. The extension in economic or cross-countries
trade freedom has strongly impact to rich nations than poor nations. Paolo Verme
(2009), in his study, has discovered the people who believe that their life is
decided by supper-natural forces, a certain ‘fate’ or ‘destiny’ have a lower
freedom perspective than the people who believe that their successes depend on
their actions or internal factors such as skill, ability, effort or experience. Then
happiness is more than for those people with higher freedom in their mind.
Social capital or quality, quantity of institutions variables also are studied in other
research studies. Helliwell (2003), for instant, has tried to investigate the
correlation between these institutions and SWB. The research expresses a positive
correlation between the degree of subjective well-being and connectedness by

41. 32
evaluating the contribution to voluntary institutions. The same association also is
covered between subjective well-being and responsibilities by surveying the
rejection to cheat on taxes. Helliwell (2004), thereafter, also presented that
national suicide rates and public trust level have robust negative relation with the
quality and quantity of social capital. This suicide rates or public trust level,
moreover, is the measures of SWB or happiness. Therefore, this evidence proves
that the social determinants have strong effect to one’s happiness level and they
should be concerned in happiness studies.
In summary, this chapter explain notation of happiness carefully. In philosophy,
the notation of happiness is similar to subject-wellbeing or life satisfaction and it
could be used interchangeably with these notations when doing research on this
issue. The literature review also reveals some determinants which have a robust
effect to the individual happiness level. They include three groups: material (or
income), demographic determinants and social determinants. In which, income has
a vigorous positive effect to income with diminishing utility rule of happiness.
Other factors are paid more attention by many studies in literature and they need
be exanimated in this research as well.

42. 33
Chapter two
Socio-economic Overview of Binh Dinh province
Although affected by the global economic recession, the economy of the Binh
Dinh province for the period of 2006 - 2010 -continued to increase, year after year.
In recent years, the socio-economic issues of Binh Dinh province are constantly
evolving. The fields of education, health, culture, society are improved in terms of
-infrastructure investment and social welfare development. This chapter would
provide a specific view on social and economic achievements of the province in
recent years as a background for further investigation.
2.1. Overview of Economics factors
Gross domestic product (GDP) increased in an average of 10.7% per year. In
which sectors of industry and construction achieved 15.2%; agriculture, forestry
and fisheries increased by 7.1% and services of 11.2%. The value of industrial
production is increased by an average of 15.7% per year. GDP per capita increased
from approximately $ 220 in 2000 to $ 400 and $900 in 2005 and 2010
respectively. The GDP per capita increases nearly 50% over 5- year period in
average. This is a high index compared to other locations. The economic growth
has long been thought as an important target of maximizing welfare policy, and
trying to raise the material standard of living is a one way to get higher well-being
of a person. In the case of Binh Dinh, with the increase in income in recent years,
some have claimed that such income could rigidly contribute to increasing of well-
being.
The economic structure of the province has shifted towards positive. In 2000 the
structure of agriculture, forestry and fisheries industry, construction and services is
42.2% - 22.8% - 35%, to -38.4% - 26.7% - 34.9% in 2005 billion and 35% -
27.4% - 37.6% respectively in 2010. In general, the industry is developing pretty.
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43. 34
Multiple zones and industrial clusters are formed, and the infrastructure and
investment promotion of the Nhon Hoi economic zone has been developed. The
construction of Nhon Hoi economic trade, services, tourism zone and associated
economic cooperation continues to grow. This economic restructure and forming
new industrial zones has contributed to an increase in personal income. In
countries, however, the GDP per capita tells us nothing about the distribution of
that income and equality. Even if GDP per capita grows, the poor may not enjoy a
portion of that growth and poverty may not also decline as long as that
achievement. After all, the growth rate does have direct implications for all groups
and the well-being could not be the same for all people as economic growth. In
this case, some may be better and some are not. Furthermore, total exports
increased by an average of 10.2% per year. The socio-economic infrastructure
continues to be invested in advance. In the period of 2006 – 2010, the province has
mobilized investment of 37.8 trillion, accounting for 40.2% of GDP. Labor
structure has shifted in the direction of decreasing in the fields of agriculture,
forestry and fisheries and increase in industrial and service sector. All of these
factors have been remarkably contributing to the development of the province.
Currently, Binh Dinh has focused the resources to speed up the construction as
planned 8 Industrial Zones (excluding the Industrial Zone in Nhon Hoi Economic
Zone) with a total planned area of 1,761 ha, 37 industrial clusters with a total area
of 1,519.37 hectare, especially Nhon Hoi economic Zone (12,000 hectare,
including 1,300 ha of industrial parks); the province has also focused on building
Quy Nhon City (as a city with grade of 1) to become the growth-center of south
area and a transporting hub of direct services to the Central Highlands;
construction of large infrastructure projects to align -adjacent areas in the North-
South with East-West; it has also facilitated the development of the key economic
sector that the province has the advantage of processing industry, forestry and
agriculture, fisheries, handicraft production, building materials, footwear,

44. 35
garments, mechanical, deep-water seaport, manufacture and assembly of electrical,
electronic, power generation, tourism development, marine services, commercial,
financial services, banking, postal and telecommunications
In the implementation of the tasks of socio-economic development in next years,
Binh Dinh Province expect to focus all efforts to restore economic growth rate
higher than that of previous years, with GDP growth of 10% in average. To
accomplish the above objectives, Binh Dinh Province is focusing on improving the
investment environment and business, encouraging investment promotion,
boosting industrial production, development of services to promote economic
growth. In coming years, it is imperative to strengthen managerial measures to
remove difficulties for production and business, to promote investment in the
project, effectively, contributing to economic development in the province. In
particular, special priority is administrative procedure reform, improving the
investment environment, and reviewing the slow implementation of investment
projects and investment promotion in key projects.
Specifically, the Binh Dinh provincial government- is working to review
investment projects, including notably the international deep-water port project of
Nhon Hoi, in which shares owned by the company, with a total investment from
nearly $ 1.2 billion, started in 2007, but due to non-implementation, forcing the
governors to withdraw and hand the Vietnam Maritime Corporation to research
and invest.
In addition, the province will implement specific solutions to urge support of
investors rapidly deploy project schedule commitments, such as infrastructure
investment projects Zone A - Nhon Hoi Economic Zone, infrastructure investment
projects Zone B - Nhon Hoi Economic Zone ...
2.2. Contribution to happiness at glance
As descried in previous sector, many factors can affect to the happiness level of
individual such as mental health, physical health, local facilities satisfaction,
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45. 36
household, being a female, having partner, high qualification, owned-house status,
being employed or living in city…the next sections mainly provides a glance view
on these factors in other help readers with a robust framework about what they are
intend to research.
At first, infrastructure of education, training and vocation develops, expands and
improves in both quality and quantity. Social work of education is to promote and
diversify the types of school and the methods of training, to better meet the
learning needs and developing human resources. In the school year 2009 – 2010,
the number of kindergarten children reached 46,000 persons, schooling pupils of
307,300 persons, resulting in primary education and literacy is maintained, and
therefore the literacy at the level of secondary school completed in 2004. Not only
being interested in primary education, the governors pay special attention to early
childhood education, being one of the prerequisites for primary education. The
lacking of educational facilities has now been restored after a long period of
difficulty in many localities. For example, only 4 communes have no preschool
classes. The change in treatment policy for teachers makes a strong development
in recent years. The investment for teachers, in general, is given special attention.
Quy Nhon University is one of the best universities in training new teachers for
the country with high reputation of the pedagogical department. The university has
been striving to meet national standards, standards of infrastructure to ensure
quality teaching and learning equivalent to other areas in the country. Training and
retraining for workers is enhanced, in 5 years for training, retraining over 10
thousand participants to create jobs for more than 12 thousand employees. Higher
education as well as colleges is increasingly expanding in scale. Training
programs for educational facilities are increasingly, gradually upgraded and
renewed. For Binh Dinh educational experiment, it pays more attention to both
higher and elite education. The higher education on the one hand has to meet the
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