The Price of Happiness in Cities

Where we choose to live is arguably the most important decision we’ll ever make. But current research is conflicted as to what makes us happier: urban or suburban life. A recent set of studies from the sociologist Adam Okulicz-Kozaryn sheds additional light on the relationship between where we live and how happy or unhappy we are.

The first study, co-authored by Joan Maya Mazelis and published in Urban Studies, uses data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 2005 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System to measure happiness across more than 230 counties in the U.S. The study uses statistical analysis to identify the cause of unhappiness in urban, suburban, and rural counties, while controlling for the less desirable aspects of city life such as poverty, crime, and unemployment, and the characteristics of cities themselves (their size, density, and heterogeneity).