Public expenditures and happiness: Türkiye example

Happiness is an emotion felt by every individual, and it is a concept that is not possible to measure and express with numerical data. On the other hand, happiness has been the common goal of everyone from past to present. Individuals have made many efforts to be happy. Although there are many factors affecting happiness, which is a relative concept, most of the research focuses on the relationship between happiness and economy. The subject of happiness, which was previously examined only in the field of psychology, has recently begun to be examined frequently from an economic perspective. From an economic point of view, happiness examines the economic policies implemented by the state in order to increase people's happiness. This study aims to reveal the relationship between public expenditures and happiness in Turkey. In this context, public expenditures in Turkey were compared with the satisfaction in public services provided by the Turkish Statistical Institute within the framework of life satisfaction, and the relationship between public expenditures and happiness was evaluated with the help of a correlation analysis. In the correlation analysis, a statistically significant relationship was observed between the satisfaction analysis data of the Turkish Statistical Institute and the ratio of education budget, health expenditures and national security expenditures to gross domestic product. No statistically significant relationship was found between the ratio of total public expenditures to gross domestic product and life satisfaction of the Turkish Statistical Institute. In addition, the relationship between happiness and public expenditures was compared with some selected G20 countries and graphs.