While people have debated whether parents are happier than non-parents, researchers suggest that the question of whether parents are more or less happy is not the most meaningful question.
Interesting, Stevenson and Wolfers also find, a clear role for absolute income and a more limited role for relative income comparisons in determining happiness. So stop comparing yourselves to everyone else and be happy.
This is in part due to the fact that people who have children differ, on average, from those who do not have children in ways that are related to happiness, such as in their marital status, age, and income.
