IF IT does not do much for this city's morale to discover that east, west, north, and south-east London are among the least happy places in Britain, it must be dire for the poor wretch who has just been told that it is now official: He is male, middle-aged, divorced and living in London, and therefore Britain's most miserable person.
By Teresa Lim, For The Straits Times
The Prime Minister himself wanted an assessment of Britain's state of contentment (or not), so he asked the Office for National Statistics (ONS) a year ago to stray from its usual dour task of monitoring gross domestic product (GDP) and employment to measure national well-being instead.
It is a bit like asking your maiden aunt to rate your 16-year-old son's favourite music. Nonetheless, for what it is worth, the ONS duly came out at the end of last month with its 'estimates of subjective well-being' carried out between April and September last year.
BACKGROUND STORY
Now its latest study is able to pinpoint exactly where in this country the discontentment lies: London, the richest part of Britain, and the wealthy south. Nine of the 10 unhappiest places are either in London and greater London, or on its periphery. By contrast, the people 'up north', where there is less money, enjoy life more.
Mr David Cameron has been worried for some time that the old-fashioned way of measuring GDP does not give the full picture of a country's progress. It looks at how the economy is expanding, but not 'how our lives are improving'.
This very much reflects the thinking of his neighbour, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, and the growing awareness among developed countries that the dysfunctionality of their urban centres - high crime rates, social breakdown - confirms that wealth alone does not make you happier.
In a separate, earlier survey of social trends, the ONS had already discovered through measuring household incomes that while Britons have grown significantly richer over the last two decades, they have not become commensurately more content.
Now its latest study is able to pinpoint exactly where in this country the discontentment lies: London, the richest part of Britain, and the wealthy south. Nine of the 10 unhappiest places are either in London and greater London, or on its periphery. By contrast, the people 'up north', where there is less money, enjoy life more.
The ONS also found that some of the happiest people in Britain are women who stay at home to look after their families. Not only was their level of satisfaction the same as that of career women but - shock, horror - this was true even when their household incomes were lower than their working counterparts.
This of course only confirms Mr Cameron's concern that GDP currently monitors everything except 'that which makes life worthwhile', referencing a speech made in 1968 by the former US senator Robert F. Kennedy, who pointed out that GDP instead counted 'air pollution and cigarette advertising and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage'.
Each year in London, in the week before Christmas, corporate parties are in full swing. Ambulances and staff are stationed around the financial heart of this city to make sure that the men and women tottering out from their office parties after drinking prodigious amounts of alcohol do not then choke on their own vomit. Economic activity? Yes (the ambulance service gets paid overtime). Happiness? No.
Cynics may say it suits a government battling economic stagnation to include in the GDP elements beyond hard, cold cash. But, in fact, economists have begun to worry about the terrible waste built into a model that hoovers up scarce minerals and cuts down forests to provide new TV sets and handbags to people who, once their bellies are full and a solid roof is over their heads, find that owning these things no longer enhances their quality of life very much.
Economists Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen, Nobel prize-winning professors from Columbia and Harvard respectively, were asked by Mr Sarkozy in 2008 to lead a commission to rethink how GDP should be assessed. Their report recommended a shift in emphasis from measuring economic production to measuring people's well-being, and to put the sustainability of resources at the heart of any growth plan.
As President Sarkozy summarised: 'We must change the way we live, consume, and produce... in the way we think, in our mindsets and values.'
He may have led the debate on GDP, but he has much on his plate at the moment, notably the upcoming elections.
Mr Cameron, on the other hand, by pushing ahead with this ONS survey, could have made Britain among the first developed countries in the world to incorporate well-being into its national database.
The Prime Minister is not merely paying lip service to the 'new' GDP. He is actually about to introduce a minimum price for alchohol of 40 pence (80 Singapore cents) a unit, despite strong opposition from his Cabinet colleagues, because he does not like a GDP measure that would include a 'cheap booze free for all' culture to boost economic growth at the expense of social problems.
At the moment, low-price beer, cider and spirits promote heavy drinking from a young age. Research from the University of Sheffield suggests that a minimum price will bring wide-ranging benefits to society - lower hospital admissions, lower crime, lower absences from work.
If Mr Cameron's ONS statistics can re-educate the public with the notion that money is not everything, more people may move 'up north' to York or Huddersfield, where they are more content though poorer, instead of making a beeline for London. Should that happen, London will become less crowded, less snarled-up, with fewer binge-drinkers and lower crime: in short, happier.
The writer is a Singaporean based in London.
