Health, Wealth and Happiness: Week two

As December starts and Christmas approaches, the state of the nation’s well-being has slightly increased with the 2CV Well-Being Index registering at 45 this week, up 2 points from last week. Interestingly, it is women that account for the increase in satisfaction of overall well-being with a 4 point growth on last week’s 45% to 49 per cent.

Across the individual health, wealth and happiness aspects, levels remain stable with just under half of consumers reporting that they are satisfied with their health (46%) and happiness (50%), and over a quarter (27%) content about their financial situation.

On the gender gauge, we see a leap in women’s satisfaction with their financial situation this week. A third (33%) of women are said to be happy with their wealth. This could be attributed to the rise in online shopping trends and with sales enticing consumers in the run up to Christmas, festive adverts being shown across TV, online and on-demand, plus fears of postal issues may have motivated women to plan and sort their Christmas gifts in plenty of time. In contrast, male consumers reported a dip of 6 points, meaning only a fifth (21%) of men are happy with their wealth. This highlights wealth as the most changed aspect this week.

Across the age bands, it is the middle-aged group who has shown the biggest shift this week with a significant fall in wealth satisfaction. Perhaps this could be linked to the announcement of Alasdair Darling’s Pre-Budget Report and the more gloomy economic news that fills the news pages? Darling has clearly not affected the other two groups as Young People and the Grey Market reported a rise in happiness with their financial situations.

Here are the results by each age category:

Young People
Apart from a 5 point increase in levels of satisfaction with their financial situation, health and happiness amongst young people remained steady. The health measure shifted 2 points to 61% this week (down from 63%) and half of consumers in this band reported happiness levels almost the same as last week at 51% (last week 52%)

Middle-aged band
Although there may be more anxiety and pressures on this category’s lifestyle in the run up to Christmas, there are slight increases in health and happiness levels, with more than a third of people reporting fulfillment in these two aspects of their lives. Wealth however, seems to be a key factor to consider when marketing to this age group, this week’s index shows a significant drop of 8 points to only 17% now showing satisfaction with their financial situation

Grey Market
The ‘grey market’ remains the happiest group for the second week running with a steady rise to 57%, up 4 points on last week’s happiness levels. They (39%) also are slightly more content with their health conditions than the middle-aged band (38%), and have seen a marked increase in their wealth levels, up 6 points in the past seven days.