Do you want to know the top 5 habits to improve your happiness everyday?
Do you want to know the top 5 mindsets that consistently happy people have that you don’t?
Professor Lord Richard Layard is a co-editor of the World Happiness Report and one of the first economists to work on happiness. He Has written multiple books on Happiness from Happiness Lessons from a New Science, to Thrive How we can secure a better deal for mental health, and his latest book Can we be Happier.
He also started Action for Happiness an international movement to promote a happier way of living which over 300,000 people have been participating in to dramatically improve their happiness.
In this episode, we talk about:
1. Top 5 Daily actions to improve your happiness
2. Top 5 mindsets to adopt to increase your happiness
3. How to improve the mental health of the world through corporate and government policy change
And a lot more!
Resources:
https://www.richardlayard.com
Action for Happiness 6 Week Course
https://actionforhappiness.org/course
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Lord Richard Layard (00:00):
Almost the most extraordinary finding, from
all of wellbeing research isbased on these diaries studies.
You asked somebody toreconstruct yesterday, and you
write down what they were doing,who they were with, and how they
felt, scoring their happiness.
The time of day when people,this is true in both America and
(00:22):
Britain, when people are leasthappy is when they were their
boss.
Michael Bauman (00:30):
How do we truly feel like a success in every
area of our lives?
How do we feel enough and knowthat we are not alone?
Join me as I interview some ofthe top leaders and experts in
the world, from Broadwaydirectors to multimillionaire,
CEOs, neuroscientists, and moreto look behind the curtain of
success and examine not only theachievements, but also the
(00:52):
fears.
The.
doubts The loneliness and how wecan navigate through that to
create the incredible life weactually want to live.
Welcome to Success Engineering.
Hello everybody.
Welcome back to SuccessEngineering.
I'm your host, Michael Bauman.
So today we wrap up our threepart series on happiness.
(01:16):
So I've been interviewing threeof the co-editors of the World
Happiness Report.
So John Helliwell Lara Aknin andtoday we have Lord Richard
Layard on.
So Lord Richard Layard is alongwith John Helliwell he's one of
the first economist to startstudying happiness and its
effect on economies, its effecton gdp, its effect on societies
(01:38):
as a whole.
He started the organizationcalled Action for Happiness,
which will talk about this.
So we actually lay out the fivemost important things you could
do on a daily basis.
Basically five habits.
To be happier on a daily basis,along with five underlying
mindsets and principles that youcan adopt to actually, you know,
(01:58):
scientifically shown to improveyour happiness.
So we talk about that.
He's also very instrumental inthe world wellbeing movement.
You know, we think of wellbeingon an individual level.
He talks about that as well, buthe's rolling it out with these
incredible people, incredibleteam.
For the world.
Right.
It's absolutely amazing.
So, we'll, we'll get into thattoo.
And what are some big leversthat they're working on
(02:21):
addressing in terms of mentalhealth and wellbeing across, you
know, multiple differentcountries that they're doing?
So work is absolutelyincredible.
Again, I know you will get abunch out of this.
I've gotten a ton out of it.
It's been.
Awesome getting to talk withthese people and really learn a
bunch about happiness and whatreally makes us happy.
So, and you can connect with anyof these programs that he's
(02:44):
doing.
Action for Happiness, you canparticipate in that.
The World Wellbeing Movement.
Um, what's cool about that isit's working from kind of a top
down approach.
So how do we actually convincegovernments that wellbeing is
important, and that way youmeasure it, that it actually
produces tangible results, evenin terms of gdp.
How do we convince, um,businesses that it's important?
(03:05):
So really, really cool stuff.
Working from the top, you know,top down in that, working from
the bottom up and action forhappiness, doing the world,
happiness, sports.
Amazing.
So, so yeah.
Today we have Lord RichardLayard on I'm here with
Professor Lord Richard Laird.
He's a e economist that hasworked for most of his life on
how to reduce unemployment andinequality.
(03:28):
Founder for the Center ofEconomic Performance at London's
School of Economics.
He's written multiple books onHappi.
So from Happiness, which islessons from a New Science to
Thrive, which is all aboutmental health and his latest
book, which is Can We BeHappier?
Which is fantastic.
I'm excited to jump into it.
Welcome to the show here,Richard.
Happy to have you.
Lord Richard Layard (03:49):
Well, lovely to be here.
Thank you.
Michael Bauman (03:51):
Yeah, Of course, of course.
So let's start, let's start withthat background.
I mean, you're a historystudent.
You're reading Jeremy Bentham.
Kind of give the story aroundthat and how you got into
studying economics andspecifically happiness around.
Lord Richard Layard (04:06):
Well, um, I read history actually at
Cambridge University.
Um, but fortunately there were,uh, lots of papers on political
theory, which is what I foundreally interesting.
And the moment I read Ben, uh, Iwas really persuaded by.
The view that, uh, the bestsociety, uh, is the one that,
(04:26):
uh, in which people are mostenjoying their lives, feeling
happier, feeling fulfilled, uh,and I think that that has the,
been the best and most importantidea of the modern age, really.
Mm-hmm.
because it tells you, uh, as anindividual, how you should be
living, how you should, howshould you be living?
You should be trying to producethe most happiness that you can
(04:48):
in the world, which incidentallyis a pledge taken by members of
action, of happiness, uh, thatyou mentioned.
Mm-hmm.
So that's the personal message.
What you are trying to do inyour life to create happiness in
the world, including of coursefor yourself.
The second thing which followsof course, um, is what should
(05:09):
governments be doing?
Indeed?
Why do we have governments inthe first place?
Thomas Jefferson said, uh, that,life and the happiness of the
people is the only properpurpose of government.
And I think actually, if youthink, why do we have
governments, it's difficult tothink of any reason, uh, that we
have a government other than tomake life better for ourselves
(05:31):
as we experience it.
So this is the criterion whichwas laid down, not just by
Benton, but.
Most enlightened people 200years ago believed that the way
you defined, uh, a good society,the way you measured progress
was by the happiness and, uh,satisfaction, uh, of the people.
(05:53):
And I think that's been a, ahugely powerful idea.
It's influenced a, a great dealof social progress, but somehow,
because you couldn't measure.
uh, until recently, uh, it gotdisplaced by one thing that you
could measure, which was thegdp.
Mm-hmm.
And so we had.
(06:14):
In the 20th century, in thepresent century, this
extraordinary worship of G D P,I mean, everybody knows that
income is not the only thingthat makes you happy.
You know each one of us.
So we just have to think for asecond But what makes us happy?
What made us happy yesterday?
It's not all to do with earning,earning a living.
(06:35):
It's all kinds of things to do,uh, with our health, mental
health, physical health.
Health of relatives friends thanto do with our relationships
with people, uh, in our family.
Very important, of course, ourfriendships.
Um, and then of course, at work.
(06:56):
Uh, happiness at Work isextraordinarily important and we
hope we can come back to thatand, and happiness in the
community.
And.
when you do the studies of whataccounts for the huge variation
and happiness in any society,you'll find that those factors,
health and relationships explainmore of the variation, uh, than
(07:18):
income does.
But income, of course, is, isimportant.
Uh, we, we shouldn't print.
It's not especially at thebottom hand, um, but it's.
A whole part of this movementthat we are talking about to
redefine success.
I think that's how you, that isexactly.
Think of the series to redefinesuccess.
Success consists in, in successfor a society consists of having
(07:43):
people who are really enjoyingtheir lives and flourishing.
Success for an individual comesin, contributing to that.
Uh, so of course it involvesexperiencing it, uh, yourself,
but of course it, it, itinvolves at least as much, uh,
contributing to the happiness ofothers.
These are not completelyseparate.
(08:05):
Because, uh, if they were, itwould be very difficult to have
people behaving medically ifthey didn't get some kind of
inner payoff from ethicalbehavior.
What people have found now, uh,uh, the thing I particularly
like is these, uh, neuroscienceexperiments.
So they're, were the people upin the lab and they get them to
play these games where you caneither cheat or you can
(08:28):
collaborate and the, and theyfind that when they collaborate,
They get a buzz in that samepart of the brain, uh, which is
where they get rewards fromother good things that they
enjoy.
So there's an enjoyment to begot from helping other people.
And frankly, the prospects forthe human race would, uh, have
(08:51):
always been pretty poor ifpeople didn't enjoy helping
other.
Including strangers, not, nothelping people just because that
they'll reciprocate, but helpingthem because that's kind of what
you do.
That's, that's part of beinghuman.
Yeah.
So I mean, there's obviously thetwo aspects of being human
aren't there.
There's a, the very selfishthing that you, you are the most
(09:13):
important person in the world.
That's quite difficult foranybody to completely banish
that.
A little bit of our inheritednature, but the other bit,
Liking to help people, wantingto help people, enjoying other
people.
And I think a, a philosophy andthe value system has to do, it's
(09:37):
to support the outward lookingaltruistic part of human nature
against the, the more selfish.
Part of human nature.
Um, I, I think that thereligions have done that for
centuries, uh, to an extent.
They've also done some badthings, but they've done that.
(09:58):
But they have less and lesssupport, um, in modern
populations.
So that, that's why we foundedthis movement action map, is
because in the secular society,It's really important that
people have some clearphilosophy of life.
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, I think that theirphilosophy of Bentham and
(10:21):
others, um, Is that inspiringphilosophy that what you are
trying to do in your life is tocreate as much happiness as you
can in the world a and as littlemisery.
That's the pledge that membersof our Action for Happiness
Movement make.
We got about 300,000 now, um,who are also practicing.
(10:43):
Uh, through help from themovement in terms of really good
online materials, but also, uh,groups where they can, uh, learn
better how to practice that way,uh, and where they go on.
Then meeting up with fellowspirits, um, on at least a
monthly basis to, to be upliftedand inspired with help from the
(11:07):
materials of the movement.
So we're looking at thatmovement.
For, uh, thousands and thousandsof groups to emerge of
like-minded people who want toimprove the world In that way,
it's not so easy, better to gettogether with like-minded
people, uh, occasionally to beinspired to regain your sense of
(11:30):
perspective.
Kind of like when you go into achurch, you, you, you regain the
sense perspective.
Now you need to have otherstructure.
Help you to do that.
Uh, and I think that's, uh, onething which action of happiness
hopefully, uh, is offeringpeople Yeah.
Talk
Michael Bauman (11:47):
to, talk to us about that.
What exactly does that looklike?
One, because I mean obviously weall know with the pandemic and
stuff, it's community becomes alot more challenging and you're
integrating both.
So you're creating thatcommunity around the shared
values.
So talk to us about some of thecourses and what that looks like
practically in action for Well,
Lord Richard Layard (12:08):
um, before Covid.
Uh, we had ordinary face-to-facecourses of groups, uh, voluntary
group leaders, but with highlyscript.
Meetings.
So there's really powerfulmaterial there for people to,
uh, you know, turns reading itout and then discussing it.
Does this make sense to me?
(12:29):
How does it relate to my life?
And then what am I going to doas a result of it?
And then you come back the nextweek, oh, well, what did we all
do?
Did it work?
And, and then you move on tothe, the next.
Principles.
So the, the, the 10 keys ofhappiness is the, the
intellectual framework, which isbased on positive psychology.
And
Michael Bauman (12:50):
can you, can you talk about what those 10 keys
are?
Lay'em up.
Wow.
Lord Richard Layard (12:53):
Well, well, wouldn't you on the spot?
It might take a long time.
The first ones are sort of dailyactions like the five fruit and.
Five things, uh, to do each day,which is, is giving, uh,
relating, exercising, um, beinga aware, appreciating, uh, and
(13:14):
trying out new things.
These are, these are things thatyou, you should, you can think
of.
You can have various practices,whatever suits you around those.
And then the other five are thegeneral underlying mindset that
you need to have all the time.
So it's a direction, aresilience, uh, positive, uh,
(13:41):
um, acceptance.
Acceptance particularly ofyourself.
But also of course, of otherpeople, um, and meaning.
So those, are the principles.
What I will tell you, uh, isthat we take this as a framework
for these monthly meetings.
So we have a kind of.
like churches have a sort ofliturgy, an annual cycle of
(14:05):
thoughts and experiences.
Mm-hmm.
Um, so we take these 10 keysplus January and December for
more general as a sort offramework.
Um, but I think you asked what,what were we doing specifically?
So before Covid we had these,these group, uh, courses and
then from them emerged.
(14:26):
Ongoing groups, uh, and thecourses, uh, we evaluated in a
pro with a proper randomized,uh, wait list control.
Uh, and we found something whichamazed even me, that the, in the
increase in the person's ownhappiness, uh, two months after
taking the course, As comparedwith the control group was as
(14:49):
big as the increase inhappiness, which somebody has
when they move from unemploymentinto work or, or when they find,
uh, a partner that they want toshare their life with.
So, wow, these are big, big,high impact experiences.
Uh, I'll tell you somethingelse, which.
(15:09):
Please me a lot about thisstudy.
We found that the people joiningthese groups were not just
middle class because of the waywe, we, we managed to advertise
them both locally and of courseon the web.
We were getting a completespread of people and it it
spread of people in terms ofincome, but we are also getting
(15:30):
a spread of people.
In terms of happiness.
In fact, we got rather morepeople who are, uh, at the
bottom end unhappy and rathermore people at the top end who
were really, really, uh, quitethriving.
Interesting.
And, but what you see happens inthose groups is that these
(15:50):
groups, these people share onthe basis of complete equality
That really never happens.
An ordinary society.
It happens to a degree inchurch.
You all kneel down, but itdoesn't happen in ordinary
society that people with suchdifferent, uh, positions on a
spectrum, albeit income, albeithappiness, are all there on
(16:13):
exactly the same basis, um,sharing.
So, it seems to be a quite apowerful thing, uh, this
philosophy.
Um, shared in this way through,you know, well designed
materials, um, in including, youknow, they conclude video talks,
all kinds of things.
It improved not only thepeople's own happiness, but of
(16:35):
course we want a happy world.
People's compassion for otherpeople, um, and of course their
mental health.
Uh, so that was what we found.
This is before covid.
Now, because of Covid, we've hadto go online.
So these groups and thesecourses are currently online,
um, rather than face-to-face andthere are, there are some
(16:56):
advantages obviously, in termsof mm-hmm.
travel and so on, and doing itonline.
So it's, it's somewhat online,but my own.
Is that we'll get back to, toface-to-face because I think
there's nothing more powerful,um, in relating to somebody, uh,
face-to-face.
I mean, some people can, you,you can relate to on the screen,
(17:18):
like I can relate to you on thescreen.
that guy but not everybody isright.
So, I'm looking forward to that.
Have
Michael Bauman (17:28):
you, I mean, I, I'm sure you have, but I'm
curious as far as, you know, youwere mentioning you saw similar,
like improvements in, inhappiness in terms of someone
going from unemployment tofinding a job or finding their,
you know, partner or theirspouse.
Um, have you looked at like thatover a longitudinal kind of
area?
So like to, to look at, youknow, hedonic adaptation where
(17:49):
you have that initial spike andthen after a little while, do
you still see the maintain, um,the maintain and the happiness?
I'm curious if you've done thereaches.
No,
Lord Richard Layar (17:57):
interesting.
You mentioned it.
We, we are planning to do thatbecause of course, no.
Online, it's, it's not difficultto do.
Right.
So we're going to, we're gonnabe doing that.
Yeah.
Oh
Michael Bauman (18:05):
yeah.
No, I was just interestingaround that.
One of the things you said andthere, you know, again, we could
unpack those 10 keys for a superlong time.
Um, and another, another guest,um, Lara Aknin will be coming on
to talk about that giving.
So I'll, I'll leave that to her,her side of this.
Right.
But, um, on this, on theself-acceptance side, cuz that
is super challenging.
(18:27):
Can.
For some people.
Um, can you talk about where canpeople start to learn how to
accept themselves, um, and evenmove towards like loving
themselves and actually, youknow, enjoy being in their own
skin?
Lord Richard Layard (18:42):
Yeah, well this self-compassion, some
people call it, um, is a very,very important thing.
Let, let me say a little aboutthat, which is a, not a complete
answer to your, your overallquestion, but we've had some
wonderful talks actually,because action mappings have
some very good talks, uh onYouTube So I was particularly
(19:03):
struck by the one onself-compassion, um, which was
given and.
Uh, I, I don't know about you,uh, but I'm pretty
self-critical.
I think a lot of people, uh, Uh,put yourself critical.
Um, and, and of course we knowwhy this is an, an in
evolutionary sense that peopleare more anxious than they need
(19:26):
be.
Uh, because in the Savannah, ifyou are not anxious, you
probably get eaten by the But,but, but actually our fellow
beings are, are much morecharitable than lions.
Mm-hmm.
We could come onto that.
That's an important point.
Yeah.
Most people underestimate thegoodness of other people and
their generosity, um, becausethat's kind of built in.
(19:50):
But self-criticism, um, is, isallied to that form of anxiety.
The trick, uh, that the speakerthat I'm mentioning, um, was
advocating.
is, suppose you're blamingyourself for something you did.
(20:13):
Imagine yourself being a friendof yours mm-hmm.
and, and hearing you saying.
you know, I feel about terribleabout that and think, what would
that friend say?
And of course that friend wouldbe saying, no.
I mean, everybody makesmistakes.
It's not that bad.
(20:33):
Uh, time will heal it quickly.
Just forget about it.
And, and you actually are apretty.
Person, think about the, yourstrengths rather than your
weaknesses.
This is a, thing which MartinSeligman, the founder of
Positive Psychology, has alwaysstressed.
Um, focus on your strengthsrather than weaknesses.
(20:53):
Don't spend your time trying toeradicate your weaknesses, build
on your strengths.
Uh, I think that's a, a verygood thing.
So something which I've foundvery helpful, which is, which
I'm completely different fromthis, um, is the diary o of, uh,
(21:14):
a remarkable woman called EddieHillen.
She was a Jewish lady living inAmsterdam, uh, under the Nazis.
Um, and, and she was determinednot to fear, but to live.
Enjoy life as long as, as youhad it.
and the way she did this wasthat on a daily basis, she.
(21:40):
Communed with what she calledthe deepest and best in herself.
We've, all of us got all kindsof preoc preoccupations stresses
in internal, external, butthere's a sort of core of us
that we need to be in touch withat regular intervals.
And we need to believe in, uh,that inner core, the sort of
(22:02):
best part of us and to communewith it.
And so I try and do that on adaily basis.
I suppose that's my more seriousanswer to your question.
Um, how to accept yourself and,you know, it can almost be a
physical experience.
Communion with the best part ofyourself.
I also quite like the way ofthinking about the future of the
(22:25):
world, um, depending on, uh,each of us communing.
With the best part of everybodyelse, connect with the best part
of everybody else, which ofcourse will then bring up, bring
out the best in other people ifthat's what we are trying to
connect with, rather than whatI'm afraid many economists, uh,
(22:46):
tend to do, which is to appealto what you might think as, as,
as the lower people's lowermotives.
I think people, I fear agree,like, like you to appeal to
their higher motives, uh, and,and to respond because.
The appeal to the highermotives, uh, as I think that,
(23:07):
uh, I sometimes go to a Quakermeeting.
I'm not, I'm not a member.
And George Fox said, gocheerfully about the world.
Um, Responding to that of God ineveryone.
Mm-hmm.
And that's the same sort of ideathat you're looking to find the
(23:27):
best in everybody.
And I think that's a, a reallesson for, uh, entrepreneurs as
much as for people in infriendship or in public life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (23:39):
And you'll have meditations and stuff in, in
wide variety of religions, butthe one that comes to mind is
the loving kindness one, youknow, the Buddhist meditation,
which is actually kind of thataspect.
It's basically just turninginward to yourself and saying
like, you know, may you behappy, may you be healthy, may
you be at peace.
May you be loved, and then youlearn to experience that
(24:00):
yourself, and then you expand itout to the people that you
really love, you really careabout.
A lot of times it's easy.
Then you expand that out tostrangers, like people that.
You just meet on the side of theroad and you just go like, Hey,
I want, I actually wish that youwould be happy.
I wish that you'd be at peace.
Lord Richard Layard (24:17):
Exactly.
You would be left.
Exactly.
Michael Bauman (24:18):
Exactly.
And then you train yourself todo it for your enemies ideally.
Right.
that's the, that's the ninja,ninja level
Lord Richard Layard (24:27):
It is a radical change of perspective
undoubtedly.
I try and practice it in theunderground, uh, the subway
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Human beings tend to.
in response to any situation orperson figure out do I like or
don't like.
Right.
Um, try, try and figure out.
(24:48):
Yeah.
I do like I do like try andimagine what could be good for
that person.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (24:56):
What does that look like?
Like, so I'm just curious, I, ifyou're willing to share, like,
connecting with your, you know,the really core essence of
yourself on a daily basis.
So you mentioned, you know, forthe strangers, you know, or like
people that you don'tnecessarily know, but if, if you
wouldn't mind sharing, um, I'mcurious, what does that look
like for you?
To do it for yourself on a dailybasis?
Lord Richard Layard (25:16):
It's, it's nothing special.
Every morning when I go outtathe door, walk down the, um,
that's, I do.
Mm-hmm.
Michael Bauman (25:27):
I think I was so, it's so beautiful cuz it is,
it is.
Right.
Like that, the distinctionbetween basically us and them is
what's cost every war, everypain, every, you know, where we
draw that line and we go, thisis me and this is not me.
And the minute we say that thisis not me, um, whether we're
looking at something like, youknow, you can talk about shared
humanity and stuff like that.
(25:48):
Um, the minute we say like,Then, then it justifies the
actions that we do to make thatperson less than in whatever
area.
And that goes into all the workthat you've dedicated your life
to, whether it's on unemploymentand inequality and, and all of
that.
But, um, I wanted to get back tothe point that, that you brought
up about that myth that we can'ttrust people as well as the
(26:12):
reality actually shows.
Can you talk about the, some ofwhat it's been done with wallets
Lord Richard Layard (26:16):
In the World Happiness Report, uh, we
report the, the rankings ofcountries, um, by the Gallup
World Poll's question, which isessentially about how satisfied
are you with your life.
As many people know by now, the,the countries that come out top
are always the Scandinaviancountries.
And to explain that, um, themost powerful, is the high level
(26:42):
of trust that they have answersto questions Like, do you think
most other people can betrusted?
where, which go from sort of70%, um, in, Scandinavian
countries to about 7%.
In some other parts of theworld, Can you believe these
answers to a question like that.
So fortunately it started withthe Reader's Digest.
(27:03):
People have been doing theseexperiments and dropping wallets
in the street, you know, withmoney and them, but with an
address there and seeing as theyget returned.
Uh, and I think in Oslo andCopenhagen, every wallet was
returned.
And much smaller fractions.
Uh, I think down to about like40% in the US I think.
(27:25):
Then the question is, what dopeople, other people who didn't
see these wallets, what fractiondo they think will be returned?
Mm-hmm.
and in almost every country, thefraction the number of wallets
returned was about double whatpeople thought would happen.
(27:46):
Um, and I think that's veryinteresting.
I, here's another extraordinaryfact that came outta this study
that, um, they tried puttingdifferent amounts of money in
the wallets, and the walletsthat got most returned were the
ones that had the most money onthem.
Mm.
Um, which is not what standardeconomics wouldn't predict, but
(28:10):
it, it, it's to do with fellowfeeling.
You know, you can feel the painof the other person if they lost
a wallet with a lot of valuablesint it, and you, you are going
to take more trouble to, to getit back to them.
So, yeah, there's, there's lotsof evidence of this thought.
In general.
many people, uh, certainly in mygeneration read the novel called
(28:31):
The Lord of the Flies, abouthow, in this case, uh, young
children, youngest children, um,sort of devoid of a police force
and other sources of, um,pressure to conform how, how
they will tear into each other.
Completely untrue.
(28:52):
There's a wonderful book by, bysomebody called Waka Bregman
called Humankind RatherBeautiful titles.
It's kinda two separate words,but also one separate, one word.
Oh, gotcha.
Humankind.
So he, he rec records the story,a true story of what happened
when a group of, I'm not surewhat nation they came from.
(29:13):
Anyway, a group of boys did getmarooned on an island.
Mm-hmm.
and they behaved exactly, uh,the opposite of what the Lord of
the FL said.
They, they really pulledtogether, and of course, that's
what happened in, in challengingsituations.
people don't go around lootingor whatever.
They didn't in the Blitz inEngland, they're not doing it in
(29:34):
Ukraine.
they pull together when achallenging situation.
So human age has got a lot ofgood in it.
Michael Bauman (29:44):
Yeah.
Talk to us about, you know, theresearch that you guys have been
seeing on the World HappinessReport around the effect of
covid to that exact, to thatexact.
Lord Richard Layard (29:54):
Well, it's quite interesting.
One of the questions the GallupWorld Pole asked is, uh, did you
help a stranger in the lastmonth?
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, the proportionsanswering yes to that, uh, shot
up worldwide and covid,actually, they've remained high,
uh, even in 2022.
(30:16):
Uh, I learn.
This is, this is leakinginformation from the 2023 World
Happiness Report, but, it'sencouraging.
Um, and I think, I think we allexperienced that sense of social
cohesion during these lockdowns.
It's been a challenge, but theeffects have not all been bad.
(30:36):
People started talking to theirneighbor.
Yeah, it
Michael Bauman (30:40):
was just good So talk to us about, cuz I'm
curious, and, and, and JohnHewell, he didn't have, you
know, cuz obviously there's nota lot of data that you guys can
pull from since 2020.
So it's a similar kind ofquestion around, you know, when
you have this crisis, you know,people rally together around the
crisis and you might see thatinitially, but it's a difference
(31:01):
between like acute pain andchronic pain when you're in
chronic pain and then we, youknow, Recessions and you know,
what the world's going throughright now.
Um, I'm curious, just on themental health aspect, have you
started to see how that'saffecting, you know, people kind
of the sustained nature of thesecrises?
Lord Richard Layard (31:21):
Well, mental health, uh, deteriorated,
I think worldwide.
Mm-hmm.
during, the covid.
Um, on average, obviously somepeople may have had an
improvement, but, but on averagethere was a, big increase in
problems, especially for.
Younger people for whom, youknow, being locked up, at that
crucial period when you areforming relationships and so on
(31:45):
is a massive deprivation.
And of course, children beingkept away from school with also
a big problem and, and pressureon on many families, um, having
to spend all their timetogether.
Um, Really, really challenging.
So yeah, that's been a, very bigproblem.
(32:07):
The plus side is that the, um,it's led people to stop
neglecting so much, thisincredibly important factor.
So in our work, trying toexplain the variation of
happiness across people or theincidents of mis.
Across people.
As I mentioned earlier, thesingle biggest factor is simply
(32:30):
the, the answer to a very simplequestion.
Have you ever been diagnosedwith depression or anxiety
disorders?
Just that one question explainsso much more than income or, uh,
any other factor.
And, uh, it is extraordinarythat, uh, our healthcare systems
(32:50):
worldwide.
Um, pay so little attention,particularly to those common
mental disorders for which thereare really good psychological
treatments, if people aregetting treated at all.
And, and that's the firstdistinction, obviously, that if
you have the physical problem oryou break your leg or whatnot,
you automatically treated.
(33:10):
But if you break your heart, youdon't get treated, uh, something
like.
40% is the highest fraction inany country, a fraction of
mentally ill people who are intreatment, um, which is deeply
shocking.
So, we persuaded the Britishgovernment to put on a big
program to, um, make evidentbased psychological therapy
(33:37):
available to, uh, anybodysuffering from an anxiety
disorder like PTs, D O C D.
Phobias, panics all those thingsor, or depression.
We managed to train up a reallygood workforce rollout services
measure the outcomes.
(33:58):
And I think it is very importantif we want to get mental health
treatments widely spread, thatwe measure the outcomes and we
show we're getting something.
In return for the money spent,um, measured the outcomes.
Uh, we had within an average ofnot more than, uh, eight
sessions average, um, a recoveryrate of 55% and an improvement
(34:21):
rate of 75%, um, which is, whichis what you would expect given,
given the trial.
So it's worthwhile.
Uh, paying attention tosystematically rolling out a
service with, uh, high standardsand, properly, trained
(34:42):
workforce.
Our system has been calledImproving Access Psychological
Therapy.
It's now being copied in aboutseven to eight countries around
the world.
Mm.
And, if anybody has got theirtime or energy or influence,
listening to this program to dosomething about this.
I'm not, I'm not a, apsychologist at all, but I, I,
(35:03):
um, have been involved in, intrying to.
And successfully making thishappen when we're treating now,
uh, nearly three quarters ofmillion people, uh, a year.
having started about 15 yearsago.
So this is something that can bedone, I think is really
important.
If our objective is to have amore successful society in the
(35:24):
terms of really defin.
Michael Bauman (35:26):
Yeah, I mean that's, it's really interesting
what, what you're talking about,like one of the biggest factors
on the negative side is thataspect of mental health.
And so you're, you know,targeting that.
And then you look at, one of thebiggest kind of predictors on
the positive side is that answerto that question, you know, how,
how would you evaluate yourlife?
And you're, you're attackingthat with, you know, the action
(35:47):
for, for happiness as well.
I'm curious, what does it looklike for.
You know, rollout on a massivekind of scale.
So you did it in the uk, you'redoing it in these other
different countries like, andthis, you know why you can get
into what you're doing too ifthis, this is better on the
world's wellbeing movement, butwhat does that look like in
terms of on a governmentallevel, how do you start
(36:10):
implementing that change?
How do you do it on a companywide level?
Like how do you top down,implement these big societal.
Lord Richard Layard (36:17):
Well, with health, of course, it is much
easier if you have a nationalhealth service, um, which we
have in Britain and a number ofcountries, um, have rather than
insurance based system.
Uh, so, you know, all theworkers are employees of the
same system.
(36:38):
Um, you train them, you canorganize the, the services, make
sure they get a.
Placement, uh, with supervision,uh, in the early, early phases
of their career, et cetera, etcetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Um, in an insurance basedsystem, the training and the
provision are more separate.
(36:59):
Um, but on the provision side,it's crucial, of course.
Uh, It's not stingy when itcomes to the number of sessions
that an insurer will fund.
I believe in many countries, youknow, it's six sessions.
And, and then you, you know,there had to be a complete
(37:19):
fundamental reappraisal.
Can you have any anymore?
I mean, it's extraordinary.
It's like saying, you know, um,okay, you, your knee's in
trouble.
Um, you can have the first halfof the operation and then we
build review et worth doing theother half.
I mean, it's.
It's deeply shocking.
And of course, the, the costsinvolved in these mental health
(37:43):
treatments are tiny.
Um, I mean, we pointed out, thecost of these treatments, is,
part.
Got back by savings on physicalhealthcare.
So something like a third ofpeople with mental health
problems also have a physicalhealth problem.
Mm-hmm.
(38:04):
it's been shown that thosepeople, if you treat the mental
health problem, um, theirreduction in physical, physical
healthcare for their physicalproblem will be enough to pay
for the, uh, psychological.
Treatment.
Mm-hmm.
So that's an A no-brainer, isn'tit?
Just within the healthcaresystem with or within the
(38:26):
insurance system.
Mm-hmm.
at the level of a government, ifit's a national health service,
there's also all those savingson, um, disability benefits and,
uh, lost taxes and so on, whichalso, Uh, provides savings, at
least as great as the originalcost of their psychological
(38:49):
therapy, which is partly how wegot this, uh, service
established in, in the firstplace.
So in the country, withinsurance system, you've gotta
have sensible, sensibleattitudes by the insurance
providers, but you've also gotto have a parallel, um, drive
(39:09):
to, to train the.
Mm, so so it's a more difficultYeah.
Operation to concert, but it'svery, very important that it's
concerted, of course.
Michael Bauman (39:21):
Yeah.
Can you talk about what you aredoing with, um, the world's
wellbeing movement and you know,what that is and yeah.
How that's affected?
Lord Richard Layard (39:28):
Well, we haven't talked about work so
far.
So action Happiness is a sort ofgrassroots movement of people
trying to produce Happi world inthe way they themselves live.
But, um, also as Jeremy Benonpointed out, uh, union need
governments, and businessleaders.
From the top to be applying thesame kind of principles, uh, to
(39:52):
the things which they caninfluence.
So if we were to focus on,business leaders for a moment.
Mm-hmm.
Um, there's obviously anenormous amount they could do.
So this movement, the WorldWellbeing Movement is a top-down
movement.
A partnership of 12 or more ofthe world's leading companies,
um, are funding it.
(40:13):
Um, and it, it, its aim istwofold.
One.
Get, business leaders to takethe wellbeing of the workforce
in particular, uh, a lot moreseriously and use evidence-based
ways of improving the atmosphereat work.
But, and two, uh, to persuadegovernments that the aim of
(40:35):
their government should be thewellbeing of the people.
But let, let's just focus on, onwork at the moment because.
I mean, almost the mostextraordinary finding, uh, from
all of wellbeing research isbased on these diaries studies
You asked somebody toreconstruct yesterday, and you
write down now by, uh, what theywere doing, um, who they were
(41:01):
with and how they.
felt Scoring and their, theirhappiness and the time of day
when people, this is true inboth America and Britain, when
people are least happy is whenthey were their boss.
I mean, this is something.
So deeply shocking to me.
The person who should beinspiring you, recognizing your
(41:24):
efforts and so on, appreciatingyou, um, is putting you down.
Uh, this is is absolutely notthe way to improve the bottom
line and suddenly not the wayit's produced, uh, be society,
which is one way, reason why.
The relationships at work arefiguring so high in people's
(41:47):
overall evaluation mm-hmm.
Of, of their own happiness.
So, so what could be done aboutthis?
Well, I think first this is whatthe World Wellbeing movement
wants first.
That, that every companymeasures the wellbeing of people
because you.
You tend not to take things, uh,seriously, uh, enough if you
(42:09):
don't measure them.
Uh, assuming they can bemeasured, which this can be
readily done.
And the, uh, world Movement isaiming to establish a sort of
canonical, uh, set of fivequestions, which all companies
will ask so that any company cansee how it's doing compared with
other companies, and act, actaccordingly.
(42:32):
Now, how would it act then if itwanted to improve the wellbeing
of this workforce?
I think there are a number of,of areas.
I mean, first there's, there'sthe empowerment of workers.
We know that if workers feelthey can have some influence
over their work situation, thatthey are much happier than if
(42:53):
it's just dictated from above.
And they've been really goodexperiments like the, uh,
so-called STAR experiment, whichwas led from M I t.
Um, The, uh, system of takingdecisions about how the work is
allocated, um, within a team.
(43:14):
it's done with much more, uh,participation by the team
members, um, than had been therebefore.
And it's been evaluated.
It reduces quits by a third andso on.
It's just such an obvious way toimprove the, uh, wellbeing of
people in a team.
(43:37):
Obviously, you want the teamleaving a leader to be appointed
on basis of ability to lead.
That's not.
Uh, but common, there's been asurvey which showed that, uh,
that psychometrically, thetypical, uh, leader of the team
was not somebody who had theequalities for leading the team,
(43:59):
uh, as much as many othermembers of the team.
This is a, big issue, but thenthere's the issue of avoiding
dysfunctional things.
So a lot of pay is verydysfunctional at the moment.
Mm-hmm.
Um, if people are workingindividually, of course
(44:20):
performance related pay, whereyou can measure the individual's
output, uh, it is totallyreasonable and natural.
But if they're working in a teamwhere you can't measure the
contribution of one personcompared with another.
it's very dysfunctional to tryto import some kind of ranking
because, uh, it has the effectof hurting more people than it,
(44:47):
than it motivates and rewards.
And it's, um, also been shownnot to be, Uh, conducive to
improved productivity.
So to get away from fourthranking I think is incredibly
important.
Then of course, there's thewhole attitude to mental health.
Uh, we must have team leaderswho are comfortable saying to
(45:09):
somebody, uh, are you okay?
And if they say, well, um, Idunno really, uh, to be able to
have that conversation, to knowthat there are ways in which
people can be helped.
Encourage them to get the help,if they have to take time off to
enable'em to do it, if they needto re return afterwards
gradually to facilitate that.
(45:31):
The whole mental healthconsciousness is very important
and.
I'm really encouraged that manyorganizations are much more
mental health consciousness.
I mean, it may surprise youthat, for example, a really, uh,
um, Pioneering organization inthis field, uh, has been the
(45:54):
Bank of England Oh, wow.
You wouldn't think that issurprising.
I couldn't, I couldn't covercouple of talks there.
They've got a very flourishingmental health.
Network and everybody isabsolutely clear that this is,
it's not stigmatizing.
This is something you've gottabe able to talk about.
It happens to most people.
(46:14):
At some point.
Let's support people understandit, know that it's not the end
of their life.
If they go through it, they'llcome back the other end and, uh,
can be even better, uh, afterthat.
So, A sensible approach to, tomental health is also obviously
something which is the featureof any good workplace.
(46:36):
Wow, that's, yeah, that'stremendous.
Michael Bauman (46:39):
How do you go about, so I'm curious for you,
uh, like on the, on the kind ofquote unquote marketing side of
these things, are you marketing,quote unquote, with the
evidence, just basically showingcompanies like, you can actually
save more money, you can be moreproductive.
Is that what it, what it lookslike, or what is it?
What does it look like to Thatis
Lord Richard Layard (46:58):
exactly, exactly, exactly.
And we've only just started thisthing, uh, This summer, um, it
has a secretary in OxfordUniversity, and that's exactly
it.
That, is the sort of stuffbecoming outta it.
The other arm, as I said, uh, isthe arm to persuade governments
(47:19):
to make this, aim.
Now that has been going, I wouldsay even a bit more slowly, uh,
than with business.
I think business have become,Accustomed to talking about
wellbeing, uh, than governmentso far.
But there is a big groundswell.
So, uh, I think you couldperhaps start with messaging
(47:45):
coming from the internationalorganizations, uh, like the
European Union and the O C D in.
Asking their members to putpeople's wellbeing at the center
of their policy design.
Mm-hmm.
that, that's a big step forward.
Uh, there are five countriesthat belong to the so-called
wellbeing economy, governmentAlliance, uh, which is New
(48:08):
Zealand.
Uh, they made a splash, and ofcourse they've got another
charismatic Prime Minister byhaving a so-called wellbeing
budget.
Iceland, and uh, fin.
Uh, actually all three are womenprime ministers, which is
interesting, and so doesScotland, which is also also a
(48:29):
member of this alliance.
Um, and Wales is the fifth, but,this is step by step process.
So it's a huge step forward withwhat they've done, but they've
not got got to the point, whichI want governments to
eventually, and it'll take yearsfor this to happen where.
Instead of when you do the costbenefit analysis on the policy,
(48:51):
you ask, how does this policycontribute to, to G D P?
You're asking how does thispolicy contribute to the
wellbeing of the people?
So to, to back that up, youknow, you've got to have the
wellbeing, science and themethodology which people like
ourselves are trying to, uh,develop to the point that it can
(49:12):
be, can be used.
um, reliably by financeministries and treasuries, um,
to say how much should go ondifferent things.
Um, I mean, obviously you, youcan't allocate, um, resources
(49:32):
without some kind of anoverarching idea of what you're
trying to achieve.
And I think it, it is prettybarbarous that, the metric at
the moment is, is GDP andgrowth.
Mm-hmm.
uh, whereas it should bepeople's wellbeing.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (49:52):
I mean, the work that you're, you're doing is
just tremendous because you areproviding those, those metrics
around it, and you're doing itin that, uh, order of a kind of
ascending, you know, ordescending priority as far as
like, let's look at mentalhealth because that makes so
much a difference with thatquestion, you know, anxiety and
depression.
So let's look at that.
(50:12):
Then let's, let's work it down,you know, the physical health.
How does the mental beginningaffect that?
The relationships, you know, andthen action for ha, happiness,
like you're talking about fromthe ground up.
But can you talk Al also about,um, as we kind of wrap up here,
can you talk about your book,um, can we be happier and one
where people can go to get it,but then also, you know, what,
(50:32):
what they'd get out of it.
I can show it.
Lord Richard Layard (50:36):
Oh, there it is.
And, and of the paper back.
I haven't got the paper backyet.
So this, um, has, uh, two parts.
the first part is actuallydiscussing some of the things
we've been discussing, thegeneral philosophy mm-hmm.
um, a and what progress hasbeen.
(50:58):
And getting, uh, businesses andgovernments to accept the
philosophy.
But this, the main part of the,um, goes through, uh,
professions who can do what.
chapter five, each of us.
That's action for happiness andthe kind of things we've talked
about, but then we go throughteachers, school teachers, we've
(51:21):
talked a bit about that.
Uh, managers, we talked a bitabout that.
Health professionals, we talkeda bit about that.
Families, we haven't talked muchabout.
Family conflict, which is one ofthe major sources of misery, of
course, or lack of a partner.
The, the both of these are, aremajor sources of misery, but I
(51:45):
am very keen that familyconflict and domestic violence,
which people do talk about now,shouldn't be thought of as
criminal justice issues.
These are health issues, mentalhealth issues, and there are
actually.
Good treatment.
A fine volume of of treatmentsfor family conflict.
(52:07):
These should be availablethrough.
The healthcare system.
Um, I think when this happenedover the next 25 years, it will
make a big difference to oursociety.
Um, and domestic violence ofcourse.
Likewise, um, I mean other veryuntreated areas incidentally,
(52:28):
uh, is addiction, which is, isquite shocking and a lot of
drying out clinic.
Then the psychological backup todeal with the underlying problem
that got the person into thecondition in the first place is,
is deplorably rare.
So, but then we, then we go intoonto communities.
(52:50):
um, community safety, peoplefeeling safe in their
communities, feeling they belongin their communities.
They know people, um, uh, haverewarding experiences, but
cities are laid out in ways thatmake people feel they belong.
All that's very important.
Then I go on to my my ownprofessional economist.
(53:13):
Politicians and then scientists.
Cause I, I do think that anyanybody who takes the Bentham
philosophy seriously, uh, and isembarking on a, a research
career, for example, I mean,they would naturally think, I
don't say everybody should, Imean, they should also of
(53:34):
course, follow their curiosity.
But I think a natural thing tosay is, you know, which, which,
what area?
Um, that I work on could makemost difference to human
wellbeing.
And so I say of course, numberone, climate change.
Mm-hmm.
um, cheap, cheap, clean energy,uh, should be attracting the,
(53:57):
the best minds in a society.
Mm-hmm.
uh, and then I say pain reliefof.
Of course, pain relief, massiveissue, uh, physical pain and
mental pain.
So many, uh, of these issuesare, are really, so deeply un
(54:18):
understudied.
Mm-hmm.
it's a matter of a general wayof thinking about everyth.
That, I'm advocating, isn't it,it's not just a little bit, it's
a total way in which you thinkabout.
Michael Bauman (54:29):
Yeah, well, there you go.
If you fall into any of thosecategories, which is everybody,
and you can be happier.
That's what I also love too,about everything that you do is
going, can we show the evidence?
Like everything is based in theevidence.
What does the evidence say andhow does this affect this arena
with whatever you're looking at,which is just phenomenal.
(54:50):
So definitely, definitely getthe book.
Where can people go to get thebook?
Where can they go?
Where would you like them to goto?
Well,
Lord Richard Layard (54:56):
I would imagine.
Amazon
Michael Bauman (54:58):
is the, is the go-to
Lord Richard Layard (55:00):
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Michael Bauman (55:03):
What about for you personally?
You like, where can they go toConnect, either with what you're
doing, and I'll put linksactually to this for the show
notes, for action, forhappiness, and if there's other
places that you want them to goto connect with you or the work
that you're doing.
Lord Richard Layard (55:18):
Um, they are welcome to write to me um,
rlayard1@gmail.com Please go to,to the Action of Happiness
website.
Mm-hmm.
if you are interested in how tohave a more purposeful, and
rewarding.
Inner life.
(55:40):
This is ultimately, of course,about the, the inner life which
motivates both what you do foryourself and what you do for
others.
Um, but also, also look out forpublic debate about wellbeing as
a proper, um, goal for forbusiness, for its workers,
(56:01):
because that will be good forthem and for the bottom line.
And also for, for governments,and I'm looking to see a, a big
change in the, the nature of thepublic debate about the world.
We want, um, a challenge, uh, Aworldwide challenge to the
(56:24):
growth fixation.
I'm not against growth.
Growth will happen.
You can't stop growth.
Uh, I mean, it is extraordinarythat nobody thought of putting
wheels onto a, um, a piece ofluggage until recently.
That's economic growth.
It'll go on forever.
Um, but the obsession, um, withgrowth r rather than the meeting
(56:49):
of human need, uh, I think issomething that really needs
challenging.
Mm-hmm.
and, uh, let's hope all of youcan contribute to this great
debate and make wellbeing thecenterpiece of that debate.
Mm.
Michael Bauman (57:05):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you so much foreverything.
I mean, I can thank you for themillions of people that you
have, you've impacted, um, inyour decades of work in this, in
this field.
So thank you so much for whatyou're doing and, and thank you
for taking the, the time heretoday.
Lord Richard Layard (57:23):
Well, it was lovely, lovely talking to
you.
And uh, thank you, uh, thank youall for listening.
Absolutely.
Michael Bauman (57:30):
Before you go, I would love it if you actually
just shared this episode with afriend.
I'm sure while you werelistening, someone just popped
in your head and you're like,oh, they would probably like
this as well.
So it's really easy.
You just click the share buttonon either the website or
whatever podcast platform you'reon and send it over to'em, and
chances are they'll probablylike it too.
Until next time, keepengineering your success.
Almost the most extraordinary finding, from
all of wellbeing research isbased on these diaries studies.
You asked somebody toreconstruct yesterday, and you
write down what they were doing,who they were with, and how they
felt, scoring their happiness.
The time of day when people,this is true in both America and
(00:22):
Britain, when people are leasthappy is when they were their
boss.
Michael Bauman (00:30):
How do we truly feel like a success in every
area of our lives?
How do we feel enough and knowthat we are not alone?
Join me as I interview some ofthe top leaders and experts in
the world, from Broadwaydirectors to multimillionaire,
CEOs, neuroscientists, and moreto look behind the curtain of
success and examine not only theachievements, but also the
(00:52):
fears.
The.
doubts The loneliness and how wecan navigate through that to
create the incredible life weactually want to live.
Welcome to Success Engineering.
Hello everybody.
Welcome back to SuccessEngineering.
I'm your host, Michael Bauman.
So today we wrap up our threepart series on happiness.
(01:16):
So I've been interviewing threeof the co-editors of the World
Happiness Report.
So John Helliwell Lara Aknin andtoday we have Lord Richard
Layard on.
So Lord Richard Layard is alongwith John Helliwell he's one of
the first economist to startstudying happiness and its
effect on economies, its effecton gdp, its effect on societies
(01:38):
as a whole.
He started the organizationcalled Action for Happiness,
which will talk about this.
So we actually lay out the fivemost important things you could
do on a daily basis.
Basically five habits.
To be happier on a daily basis,along with five underlying
mindsets and principles that youcan adopt to actually, you know,
(01:58):
scientifically shown to improveyour happiness.
So we talk about that.
He's also very instrumental inthe world wellbeing movement.
You know, we think of wellbeingon an individual level.
He talks about that as well, buthe's rolling it out with these
incredible people, incredibleteam.
For the world.
Right.
It's absolutely amazing.
So, we'll, we'll get into thattoo.
And what are some big leversthat they're working on
(02:21):
addressing in terms of mentalhealth and wellbeing across, you
know, multiple differentcountries that they're doing?
So work is absolutelyincredible.
Again, I know you will get abunch out of this.
I've gotten a ton out of it.
It's been.
Awesome getting to talk withthese people and really learn a
bunch about happiness and whatreally makes us happy.
So, and you can connect with anyof these programs that he's
(02:44):
doing.
Action for Happiness, you canparticipate in that.
The World Wellbeing Movement.
Um, what's cool about that isit's working from kind of a top
down approach.
So how do we actually convincegovernments that wellbeing is
important, and that way youmeasure it, that it actually
produces tangible results, evenin terms of gdp.
How do we convince, um,businesses that it's important?
(03:05):
So really, really cool stuff.
Working from the top, you know,top down in that, working from
the bottom up and action forhappiness, doing the world,
happiness, sports.
Amazing.
So, so yeah.
Today we have Lord RichardLayard on I'm here with
Professor Lord Richard Laird.
He's a e economist that hasworked for most of his life on
how to reduce unemployment andinequality.
(03:28):
Founder for the Center ofEconomic Performance at London's
School of Economics.
He's written multiple books onHappi.
So from Happiness, which islessons from a New Science to
Thrive, which is all aboutmental health and his latest
book, which is Can We BeHappier?
Which is fantastic.
I'm excited to jump into it.
Welcome to the show here,Richard.
Happy to have you.
Lord Richard Layard (03:49):
Well, lovely to be here.
Thank you.
Michael Bauman (03:51):
Yeah, Of course, of course.
So let's start, let's start withthat background.
I mean, you're a historystudent.
You're reading Jeremy Bentham.
Kind of give the story aroundthat and how you got into
studying economics andspecifically happiness around.
Lord Richard Layard (04:06):
Well, um, I read history actually at
Cambridge University.
Um, but fortunately there were,uh, lots of papers on political
theory, which is what I foundreally interesting.
And the moment I read Ben, uh, Iwas really persuaded by.
The view that, uh, the bestsociety, uh, is the one that,
(04:26):
uh, in which people are mostenjoying their lives, feeling
happier, feeling fulfilled, uh,and I think that that has the,
been the best and most importantidea of the modern age, really.
Mm-hmm.
because it tells you, uh, as anindividual, how you should be
living, how you should, howshould you be living?
You should be trying to producethe most happiness that you can
(04:48):
in the world, which incidentallyis a pledge taken by members of
action, of happiness, uh, thatyou mentioned.
Mm-hmm.
So that's the personal message.
What you are trying to do inyour life to create happiness in
the world, including of coursefor yourself.
The second thing which followsof course, um, is what should
(05:09):
governments be doing?
Indeed?
Why do we have governments inthe first place?
Thomas Jefferson said, uh, that,life and the happiness of the
people is the only properpurpose of government.
And I think actually, if youthink, why do we have
governments, it's difficult tothink of any reason, uh, that we
have a government other than tomake life better for ourselves
(05:31):
as we experience it.
So this is the criterion whichwas laid down, not just by
Benton, but.
Most enlightened people 200years ago believed that the way
you defined, uh, a good society,the way you measured progress
was by the happiness and, uh,satisfaction, uh, of the people.
(05:53):
And I think that's been a, ahugely powerful idea.
It's influenced a, a great dealof social progress, but somehow,
because you couldn't measure.
uh, until recently, uh, it gotdisplaced by one thing that you
could measure, which was thegdp.
Mm-hmm.
And so we had.
(06:14):
In the 20th century, in thepresent century, this
extraordinary worship of G D P,I mean, everybody knows that
income is not the only thingthat makes you happy.
You know each one of us.
So we just have to think for asecond But what makes us happy?
What made us happy yesterday?
It's not all to do with earning,earning a living.
(06:35):
It's all kinds of things to do,uh, with our health, mental
health, physical health.
Health of relatives friends thanto do with our relationships
with people, uh, in our family.
Very important, of course, ourfriendships.
Um, and then of course, at work.
(06:56):
Uh, happiness at Work isextraordinarily important and we
hope we can come back to thatand, and happiness in the
community.
And.
when you do the studies of whataccounts for the huge variation
and happiness in any society,you'll find that those factors,
health and relationships explainmore of the variation, uh, than
(07:18):
income does.
But income, of course, is, isimportant.
Uh, we, we shouldn't print.
It's not especially at thebottom hand, um, but it's.
A whole part of this movementthat we are talking about to
redefine success.
I think that's how you, that isexactly.
Think of the series to redefinesuccess.
Success consists in, in successfor a society consists of having
(07:43):
people who are really enjoyingtheir lives and flourishing.
Success for an individual comesin, contributing to that.
Uh, so of course it involvesexperiencing it, uh, yourself,
but of course it, it, itinvolves at least as much, uh,
contributing to the happiness ofothers.
These are not completelyseparate.
(08:05):
Because, uh, if they were, itwould be very difficult to have
people behaving medically ifthey didn't get some kind of
inner payoff from ethicalbehavior.
What people have found now, uh,uh, the thing I particularly
like is these, uh, neuroscienceexperiments.
So they're, were the people upin the lab and they get them to
play these games where you caneither cheat or you can
(08:28):
collaborate and the, and theyfind that when they collaborate,
They get a buzz in that samepart of the brain, uh, which is
where they get rewards fromother good things that they
enjoy.
So there's an enjoyment to begot from helping other people.
And frankly, the prospects forthe human race would, uh, have
(08:51):
always been pretty poor ifpeople didn't enjoy helping
other.
Including strangers, not, nothelping people just because that
they'll reciprocate, but helpingthem because that's kind of what
you do.
That's, that's part of beinghuman.
Yeah.
So I mean, there's obviously thetwo aspects of being human
aren't there.
There's a, the very selfishthing that you, you are the most
(09:13):
important person in the world.
That's quite difficult foranybody to completely banish
that.
A little bit of our inheritednature, but the other bit,
Liking to help people, wantingto help people, enjoying other
people.
And I think a, a philosophy andthe value system has to do, it's
(09:37):
to support the outward lookingaltruistic part of human nature
against the, the more selfish.
Part of human nature.
Um, I, I think that thereligions have done that for
centuries, uh, to an extent.
They've also done some badthings, but they've done that.
(09:58):
But they have less and lesssupport, um, in modern
populations.
So that, that's why we foundedthis movement action map, is
because in the secular society,It's really important that
people have some clearphilosophy of life.
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, I think that theirphilosophy of Bentham and
(10:21):
others, um, Is that inspiringphilosophy that what you are
trying to do in your life is tocreate as much happiness as you
can in the world a and as littlemisery.
That's the pledge that membersof our Action for Happiness
Movement make.
We got about 300,000 now, um,who are also practicing.
(10:43):
Uh, through help from themovement in terms of really good
online materials, but also, uh,groups where they can, uh, learn
better how to practice that way,uh, and where they go on.
Then meeting up with fellowspirits, um, on at least a
monthly basis to, to be upliftedand inspired with help from the
(11:07):
materials of the movement.
So we're looking at thatmovement.
For, uh, thousands and thousandsof groups to emerge of
like-minded people who want toimprove the world In that way,
it's not so easy, better to gettogether with like-minded
people, uh, occasionally to beinspired to regain your sense of
(11:30):
perspective.
Kind of like when you go into achurch, you, you, you regain the
sense perspective.
Now you need to have otherstructure.
Help you to do that.
Uh, and I think that's, uh, onething which action of happiness
hopefully, uh, is offeringpeople Yeah.
Talk
Michael Bauman (11:47):
to, talk to us about that.
What exactly does that looklike?
One, because I mean obviously weall know with the pandemic and
stuff, it's community becomes alot more challenging and you're
integrating both.
So you're creating thatcommunity around the shared
values.
So talk to us about some of thecourses and what that looks like
practically in action for Well,
Lord Richard Layard (12:08):
um, before Covid.
Uh, we had ordinary face-to-facecourses of groups, uh, voluntary
group leaders, but with highlyscript.
Meetings.
So there's really powerfulmaterial there for people to,
uh, you know, turns reading itout and then discussing it.
Does this make sense to me?
(12:29):
How does it relate to my life?
And then what am I going to doas a result of it?
And then you come back the nextweek, oh, well, what did we all
do?
Did it work?
And, and then you move on tothe, the next.
Principles.
So the, the, the 10 keys ofhappiness is the, the
intellectual framework, which isbased on positive psychology.
And
Michael Bauman (12:50):
can you, can you talk about what those 10 keys
are?
Lay'em up.
Wow.
Lord Richard Layard (12:53):
Well, well, wouldn't you on the spot?
It might take a long time.
The first ones are sort of dailyactions like the five fruit and.
Five things, uh, to do each day,which is, is giving, uh,
relating, exercising, um, beinga aware, appreciating, uh, and
(13:14):
trying out new things.
These are, these are things thatyou, you should, you can think
of.
You can have various practices,whatever suits you around those.
And then the other five are thegeneral underlying mindset that
you need to have all the time.
So it's a direction, aresilience, uh, positive, uh,
(13:41):
um, acceptance.
Acceptance particularly ofyourself.
But also of course, of otherpeople, um, and meaning.
So those, are the principles.
What I will tell you, uh, isthat we take this as a framework
for these monthly meetings.
So we have a kind of.
like churches have a sort ofliturgy, an annual cycle of
(14:05):
thoughts and experiences.
Mm-hmm.
Um, so we take these 10 keysplus January and December for
more general as a sort offramework.
Um, but I think you asked what,what were we doing specifically?
So before Covid we had these,these group, uh, courses and
then from them emerged.
(14:26):
Ongoing groups, uh, and thecourses, uh, we evaluated in a
pro with a proper randomized,uh, wait list control.
Uh, and we found something whichamazed even me, that the, in the
increase in the person's ownhappiness, uh, two months after
taking the course, As comparedwith the control group was as
(14:49):
big as the increase inhappiness, which somebody has
when they move from unemploymentinto work or, or when they find,
uh, a partner that they want toshare their life with.
So, wow, these are big, big,high impact experiences.
Uh, I'll tell you somethingelse, which.
(15:09):
Please me a lot about thisstudy.
We found that the people joiningthese groups were not just
middle class because of the waywe, we, we managed to advertise
them both locally and of courseon the web.
We were getting a completespread of people and it it
spread of people in terms ofincome, but we are also getting
(15:30):
a spread of people.
In terms of happiness.
In fact, we got rather morepeople who are, uh, at the
bottom end unhappy and rathermore people at the top end who
were really, really, uh, quitethriving.
Interesting.
And, but what you see happens inthose groups is that these
(15:50):
groups, these people share onthe basis of complete equality
That really never happens.
An ordinary society.
It happens to a degree inchurch.
You all kneel down, but itdoesn't happen in ordinary
society that people with suchdifferent, uh, positions on a
spectrum, albeit income, albeithappiness, are all there on
(16:13):
exactly the same basis, um,sharing.
So, it seems to be a quite apowerful thing, uh, this
philosophy.
Um, shared in this way through,you know, well designed
materials, um, in including, youknow, they conclude video talks,
all kinds of things.
It improved not only thepeople's own happiness, but of
(16:35):
course we want a happy world.
People's compassion for otherpeople, um, and of course their
mental health.
Uh, so that was what we found.
This is before covid.
Now, because of Covid, we've hadto go online.
So these groups and thesecourses are currently online,
um, rather than face-to-face andthere are, there are some
(16:56):
advantages obviously, in termsof mm-hmm.
travel and so on, and doing itonline.
So it's, it's somewhat online,but my own.
Is that we'll get back to, toface-to-face because I think
there's nothing more powerful,um, in relating to somebody, uh,
face-to-face.
I mean, some people can, you,you can relate to on the screen,
(17:18):
like I can relate to you on thescreen.
that guy but not everybody isright.
So, I'm looking forward to that.
Have
Michael Bauman (17:28):
you, I mean, I, I'm sure you have, but I'm
curious as far as, you know, youwere mentioning you saw similar,
like improvements in, inhappiness in terms of someone
going from unemployment tofinding a job or finding their,
you know, partner or theirspouse.
Um, have you looked at like thatover a longitudinal kind of
area?
So like to, to look at, youknow, hedonic adaptation where
(17:49):
you have that initial spike andthen after a little while, do
you still see the maintain, um,the maintain and the happiness?
I'm curious if you've done thereaches.
No,
Lord Richard Layar (17:57):
interesting.
You mentioned it.
We, we are planning to do thatbecause of course, no.
Online, it's, it's not difficultto do.
Right.
So we're going to, we're gonnabe doing that.
Yeah.
Oh
Michael Bauman (18:05):
yeah.
No, I was just interestingaround that.
One of the things you said andthere, you know, again, we could
unpack those 10 keys for a superlong time.
Um, and another, another guest,um, Lara Aknin will be coming on
to talk about that giving.
So I'll, I'll leave that to her,her side of this.
Right.
But, um, on this, on theself-acceptance side, cuz that
is super challenging.
(18:27):
Can.
For some people.
Um, can you talk about where canpeople start to learn how to
accept themselves, um, and evenmove towards like loving
themselves and actually, youknow, enjoy being in their own
skin?
Lord Richard Layard (18:42):
Yeah, well this self-compassion, some
people call it, um, is a very,very important thing.
Let, let me say a little aboutthat, which is a, not a complete
answer to your, your overallquestion, but we've had some
wonderful talks actually,because action mappings have
some very good talks, uh onYouTube So I was particularly
(19:03):
struck by the one onself-compassion, um, which was
given and.
Uh, I, I don't know about you,uh, but I'm pretty
self-critical.
I think a lot of people, uh, Uh,put yourself critical.
Um, and, and of course we knowwhy this is an, an in
evolutionary sense that peopleare more anxious than they need
(19:26):
be.
Uh, because in the Savannah, ifyou are not anxious, you
probably get eaten by the But,but, but actually our fellow
beings are, are much morecharitable than lions.
Mm-hmm.
We could come onto that.
That's an important point.
Yeah.
Most people underestimate thegoodness of other people and
their generosity, um, becausethat's kind of built in.
(19:50):
But self-criticism, um, is, isallied to that form of anxiety.
The trick, uh, that the speakerthat I'm mentioning, um, was
advocating.
is, suppose you're blamingyourself for something you did.
(20:13):
Imagine yourself being a friendof yours mm-hmm.
and, and hearing you saying.
you know, I feel about terribleabout that and think, what would
that friend say?
And of course that friend wouldbe saying, no.
I mean, everybody makesmistakes.
It's not that bad.
(20:33):
Uh, time will heal it quickly.
Just forget about it.
And, and you actually are apretty.
Person, think about the, yourstrengths rather than your
weaknesses.
This is a, thing which MartinSeligman, the founder of
Positive Psychology, has alwaysstressed.
Um, focus on your strengthsrather than weaknesses.
(20:53):
Don't spend your time trying toeradicate your weaknesses, build
on your strengths.
Uh, I think that's a, a verygood thing.
So something which I've foundvery helpful, which is, which
I'm completely different fromthis, um, is the diary o of, uh,
(21:14):
a remarkable woman called EddieHillen.
She was a Jewish lady living inAmsterdam, uh, under the Nazis.
Um, and, and she was determinednot to fear, but to live.
Enjoy life as long as, as youhad it.
and the way she did this wasthat on a daily basis, she.
(21:40):
Communed with what she calledthe deepest and best in herself.
We've, all of us got all kindsof preoc preoccupations stresses
in internal, external, butthere's a sort of core of us
that we need to be in touch withat regular intervals.
And we need to believe in, uh,that inner core, the sort of
(22:02):
best part of us and to communewith it.
And so I try and do that on adaily basis.
I suppose that's my more seriousanswer to your question.
Um, how to accept yourself and,you know, it can almost be a
physical experience.
Communion with the best part ofyourself.
I also quite like the way ofthinking about the future of the
(22:25):
world, um, depending on, uh,each of us communing.
With the best part of everybodyelse, connect with the best part
of everybody else, which ofcourse will then bring up, bring
out the best in other people ifthat's what we are trying to
connect with, rather than whatI'm afraid many economists, uh,
(22:46):
tend to do, which is to appealto what you might think as, as,
as the lower people's lowermotives.
I think people, I fear agree,like, like you to appeal to
their higher motives, uh, and,and to respond because.
The appeal to the highermotives, uh, as I think that,
(23:07):
uh, I sometimes go to a Quakermeeting.
I'm not, I'm not a member.
And George Fox said, gocheerfully about the world.
Um, Responding to that of God ineveryone.
Mm-hmm.
And that's the same sort of ideathat you're looking to find the
(23:27):
best in everybody.
And I think that's a, a reallesson for, uh, entrepreneurs as
much as for people in infriendship or in public life.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (23:39):
And you'll have meditations and stuff in, in
wide variety of religions, butthe one that comes to mind is
the loving kindness one, youknow, the Buddhist meditation,
which is actually kind of thataspect.
It's basically just turninginward to yourself and saying
like, you know, may you behappy, may you be healthy, may
you be at peace.
May you be loved, and then youlearn to experience that
(24:00):
yourself, and then you expand itout to the people that you
really love, you really careabout.
A lot of times it's easy.
Then you expand that out tostrangers, like people that.
You just meet on the side of theroad and you just go like, Hey,
I want, I actually wish that youwould be happy.
I wish that you'd be at peace.
Lord Richard Layard (24:17):
Exactly.
You would be left.
Exactly.
Michael Bauman (24:18):
Exactly.
And then you train yourself todo it for your enemies ideally.
Right.
that's the, that's the ninja,ninja level
Lord Richard Layard (24:27):
It is a radical change of perspective
undoubtedly.
I try and practice it in theunderground, uh, the subway
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Human beings tend to.
in response to any situation orperson figure out do I like or
don't like.
Right.
Um, try, try and figure out.
(24:48):
Yeah.
I do like I do like try andimagine what could be good for
that person.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (24:56):
What does that look like?
Like, so I'm just curious, I, ifyou're willing to share, like,
connecting with your, you know,the really core essence of
yourself on a daily basis.
So you mentioned, you know, forthe strangers, you know, or like
people that you don'tnecessarily know, but if, if you
wouldn't mind sharing, um, I'mcurious, what does that look
like for you?
To do it for yourself on a dailybasis?
Lord Richard Layard (25:16):
It's, it's nothing special.
Every morning when I go outtathe door, walk down the, um,
that's, I do.
Mm-hmm.
Michael Bauman (25:27):
I think I was so, it's so beautiful cuz it is,
it is.
Right.
Like that, the distinctionbetween basically us and them is
what's cost every war, everypain, every, you know, where we
draw that line and we go, thisis me and this is not me.
And the minute we say that thisis not me, um, whether we're
looking at something like, youknow, you can talk about shared
humanity and stuff like that.
(25:48):
Um, the minute we say like,Then, then it justifies the
actions that we do to make thatperson less than in whatever
area.
And that goes into all the workthat you've dedicated your life
to, whether it's on unemploymentand inequality and, and all of
that.
But, um, I wanted to get back tothe point that, that you brought
up about that myth that we can'ttrust people as well as the
(26:12):
reality actually shows.
Can you talk about the, some ofwhat it's been done with wallets
Lord Richard Layard (26:16):
In the World Happiness Report, uh, we
report the, the rankings ofcountries, um, by the Gallup
World Poll's question, which isessentially about how satisfied
are you with your life.
As many people know by now, the,the countries that come out top
are always the Scandinaviancountries.
And to explain that, um, themost powerful, is the high level
(26:42):
of trust that they have answersto questions Like, do you think
most other people can betrusted?
where, which go from sort of70%, um, in, Scandinavian
countries to about 7%.
In some other parts of theworld, Can you believe these
answers to a question like that.
So fortunately it started withthe Reader's Digest.
(27:03):
People have been doing theseexperiments and dropping wallets
in the street, you know, withmoney and them, but with an
address there and seeing as theyget returned.
Uh, and I think in Oslo andCopenhagen, every wallet was
returned.
And much smaller fractions.
Uh, I think down to about like40% in the US I think.
(27:25):
Then the question is, what dopeople, other people who didn't
see these wallets, what fractiondo they think will be returned?
Mm-hmm.
and in almost every country, thefraction the number of wallets
returned was about double whatpeople thought would happen.
(27:46):
Um, and I think that's veryinteresting.
I, here's another extraordinaryfact that came outta this study
that, um, they tried puttingdifferent amounts of money in
the wallets, and the walletsthat got most returned were the
ones that had the most money onthem.
Mm.
Um, which is not what standardeconomics wouldn't predict, but
(28:10):
it, it, it's to do with fellowfeeling.
You know, you can feel the painof the other person if they lost
a wallet with a lot of valuablesint it, and you, you are going
to take more trouble to, to getit back to them.
So, yeah, there's, there's lotsof evidence of this thought.
In general.
many people, uh, certainly in mygeneration read the novel called
(28:31):
The Lord of the Flies, abouthow, in this case, uh, young
children, youngest children, um,sort of devoid of a police force
and other sources of, um,pressure to conform how, how
they will tear into each other.
Completely untrue.
(28:52):
There's a wonderful book by, bysomebody called Waka Bregman
called Humankind RatherBeautiful titles.
It's kinda two separate words,but also one separate, one word.
Oh, gotcha.
Humankind.
So he, he rec records the story,a true story of what happened
when a group of, I'm not surewhat nation they came from.
(29:13):
Anyway, a group of boys did getmarooned on an island.
Mm-hmm.
and they behaved exactly, uh,the opposite of what the Lord of
the FL said.
They, they really pulledtogether, and of course, that's
what happened in, in challengingsituations.
people don't go around lootingor whatever.
They didn't in the Blitz inEngland, they're not doing it in
(29:34):
Ukraine.
they pull together when achallenging situation.
So human age has got a lot ofgood in it.
Michael Bauman (29:44):
Yeah.
Talk to us about, you know, theresearch that you guys have been
seeing on the World HappinessReport around the effect of
covid to that exact, to thatexact.
Lord Richard Layard (29:54):
Well, it's quite interesting.
One of the questions the GallupWorld Pole asked is, uh, did you
help a stranger in the lastmonth?
Mm-hmm.
And, uh, the proportionsanswering yes to that, uh, shot
up worldwide and covid,actually, they've remained high,
uh, even in 2022.
(30:16):
Uh, I learn.
This is, this is leakinginformation from the 2023 World
Happiness Report, but, it'sencouraging.
Um, and I think, I think we allexperienced that sense of social
cohesion during these lockdowns.
It's been a challenge, but theeffects have not all been bad.
(30:36):
People started talking to theirneighbor.
Yeah, it
Michael Bauman (30:40):
was just good So talk to us about, cuz I'm
curious, and, and, and JohnHewell, he didn't have, you
know, cuz obviously there's nota lot of data that you guys can
pull from since 2020.
So it's a similar kind ofquestion around, you know, when
you have this crisis, you know,people rally together around the
crisis and you might see thatinitially, but it's a difference
(31:01):
between like acute pain andchronic pain when you're in
chronic pain and then we, youknow, Recessions and you know,
what the world's going throughright now.
Um, I'm curious, just on themental health aspect, have you
started to see how that'saffecting, you know, people kind
of the sustained nature of thesecrises?
Lord Richard Layard (31:21):
Well, mental health, uh, deteriorated,
I think worldwide.
Mm-hmm.
during, the covid.
Um, on average, obviously somepeople may have had an
improvement, but, but on averagethere was a, big increase in
problems, especially for.
Younger people for whom, youknow, being locked up, at that
crucial period when you areforming relationships and so on
(31:45):
is a massive deprivation.
And of course, children beingkept away from school with also
a big problem and, and pressureon on many families, um, having
to spend all their timetogether.
Um, Really, really challenging.
So yeah, that's been a, very bigproblem.
(32:07):
The plus side is that the, um,it's led people to stop
neglecting so much, thisincredibly important factor.
So in our work, trying toexplain the variation of
happiness across people or theincidents of mis.
Across people.
As I mentioned earlier, thesingle biggest factor is simply
(32:30):
the, the answer to a very simplequestion.
Have you ever been diagnosedwith depression or anxiety
disorders?
Just that one question explainsso much more than income or, uh,
any other factor.
And, uh, it is extraordinarythat, uh, our healthcare systems
(32:50):
worldwide.
Um, pay so little attention,particularly to those common
mental disorders for which thereare really good psychological
treatments, if people aregetting treated at all.
And, and that's the firstdistinction, obviously, that if
you have the physical problem oryou break your leg or whatnot,
you automatically treated.
(33:10):
But if you break your heart, youdon't get treated, uh, something
like.
40% is the highest fraction inany country, a fraction of
mentally ill people who are intreatment, um, which is deeply
shocking.
So, we persuaded the Britishgovernment to put on a big
program to, um, make evidentbased psychological therapy
(33:37):
available to, uh, anybodysuffering from an anxiety
disorder like PTs, D O C D.
Phobias, panics all those thingsor, or depression.
We managed to train up a reallygood workforce rollout services
measure the outcomes.
(33:58):
And I think it is very importantif we want to get mental health
treatments widely spread, thatwe measure the outcomes and we
show we're getting something.
In return for the money spent,um, measured the outcomes.
Uh, we had within an average ofnot more than, uh, eight
sessions average, um, a recoveryrate of 55% and an improvement
(34:21):
rate of 75%, um, which is, whichis what you would expect given,
given the trial.
So it's worthwhile.
Uh, paying attention tosystematically rolling out a
service with, uh, high standardsand, properly, trained
(34:42):
workforce.
Our system has been calledImproving Access Psychological
Therapy.
It's now being copied in aboutseven to eight countries around
the world.
Mm.
And, if anybody has got theirtime or energy or influence,
listening to this program to dosomething about this.
I'm not, I'm not a, apsychologist at all, but I, I,
(35:03):
um, have been involved in, intrying to.
And successfully making thishappen when we're treating now,
uh, nearly three quarters ofmillion people, uh, a year.
having started about 15 yearsago.
So this is something that can bedone, I think is really
important.
If our objective is to have amore successful society in the
(35:24):
terms of really defin.
Michael Bauman (35:26):
Yeah, I mean that's, it's really interesting
what, what you're talking about,like one of the biggest factors
on the negative side is thataspect of mental health.
And so you're, you know,targeting that.
And then you look at, one of thebiggest kind of predictors on
the positive side is that answerto that question, you know, how,
how would you evaluate yourlife?
And you're, you're attackingthat with, you know, the action
(35:47):
for, for happiness as well.
I'm curious, what does it looklike for.
You know, rollout on a massivekind of scale.
So you did it in the uk, you'redoing it in these other
different countries like, andthis, you know why you can get
into what you're doing too ifthis, this is better on the
world's wellbeing movement, butwhat does that look like in
terms of on a governmentallevel, how do you start
(36:10):
implementing that change?
How do you do it on a companywide level?
Like how do you top down,implement these big societal.
Lord Richard Layard (36:17):
Well, with health, of course, it is much
easier if you have a nationalhealth service, um, which we
have in Britain and a number ofcountries, um, have rather than
insurance based system.
Uh, so, you know, all theworkers are employees of the
same system.
(36:38):
Um, you train them, you canorganize the, the services, make
sure they get a.
Placement, uh, with supervision,uh, in the early, early phases
of their career, et cetera, etcetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Um, in an insurance basedsystem, the training and the
provision are more separate.
(36:59):
Um, but on the provision side,it's crucial, of course.
Uh, It's not stingy when itcomes to the number of sessions
that an insurer will fund.
I believe in many countries, youknow, it's six sessions.
And, and then you, you know,there had to be a complete
(37:19):
fundamental reappraisal.
Can you have any anymore?
I mean, it's extraordinary.
It's like saying, you know, um,okay, you, your knee's in
trouble.
Um, you can have the first halfof the operation and then we
build review et worth doing theother half.
I mean, it's.
It's deeply shocking.
And of course, the, the costsinvolved in these mental health
(37:43):
treatments are tiny.
Um, I mean, we pointed out, thecost of these treatments, is,
part.
Got back by savings on physicalhealthcare.
So something like a third ofpeople with mental health
problems also have a physicalhealth problem.
Mm-hmm.
(38:04):
it's been shown that thosepeople, if you treat the mental
health problem, um, theirreduction in physical, physical
healthcare for their physicalproblem will be enough to pay
for the, uh, psychological.
Treatment.
Mm-hmm.
So that's an A no-brainer, isn'tit?
Just within the healthcaresystem with or within the
(38:26):
insurance system.
Mm-hmm.
at the level of a government, ifit's a national health service,
there's also all those savingson, um, disability benefits and,
uh, lost taxes and so on, whichalso, Uh, provides savings, at
least as great as the originalcost of their psychological
(38:49):
therapy, which is partly how wegot this, uh, service
established in, in the firstplace.
So in the country, withinsurance system, you've gotta
have sensible, sensibleattitudes by the insurance
providers, but you've also gotto have a parallel, um, drive
(39:09):
to, to train the.
Mm, so so it's a more difficultYeah.
Operation to concert, but it'svery, very important that it's
concerted, of course.
Michael Bauman (39:21):
Yeah.
Can you talk about what you aredoing with, um, the world's
wellbeing movement and you know,what that is and yeah.
How that's affected?
Lord Richard Layard (39:28):
Well, we haven't talked about work so
far.
So action Happiness is a sort ofgrassroots movement of people
trying to produce Happi world inthe way they themselves live.
But, um, also as Jeremy Benonpointed out, uh, union need
governments, and businessleaders.
From the top to be applying thesame kind of principles, uh, to
(39:52):
the things which they caninfluence.
So if we were to focus on,business leaders for a moment.
Mm-hmm.
Um, there's obviously anenormous amount they could do.
So this movement, the WorldWellbeing Movement is a top-down
movement.
A partnership of 12 or more ofthe world's leading companies,
um, are funding it.
(40:13):
Um, and it, it, its aim istwofold.
One.
Get, business leaders to takethe wellbeing of the workforce
in particular, uh, a lot moreseriously and use evidence-based
ways of improving the atmosphereat work.
But, and two, uh, to persuadegovernments that the aim of
(40:35):
their government should be thewellbeing of the people.
But let, let's just focus on, onwork at the moment because.
I mean, almost the mostextraordinary finding, uh, from
all of wellbeing research isbased on these diaries studies
You asked somebody toreconstruct yesterday, and you
write down now by, uh, what theywere doing, um, who they were
(41:01):
with and how they.
felt Scoring and their, theirhappiness and the time of day
when people, this is true inboth America and Britain, when
people are least happy is whenthey were their boss.
I mean, this is something.
So deeply shocking to me.
The person who should beinspiring you, recognizing your
(41:24):
efforts and so on, appreciatingyou, um, is putting you down.
Uh, this is is absolutely notthe way to improve the bottom
line and suddenly not the wayit's produced, uh, be society,
which is one way, reason why.
The relationships at work arefiguring so high in people's
(41:47):
overall evaluation mm-hmm.
Of, of their own happiness.
So, so what could be done aboutthis?
Well, I think first this is whatthe World Wellbeing movement
wants first.
That, that every companymeasures the wellbeing of people
because you.
You tend not to take things, uh,seriously, uh, enough if you
(42:09):
don't measure them.
Uh, assuming they can bemeasured, which this can be
readily done.
And the, uh, world Movement isaiming to establish a sort of
canonical, uh, set of fivequestions, which all companies
will ask so that any company cansee how it's doing compared with
other companies, and act, actaccordingly.
(42:32):
Now, how would it act then if itwanted to improve the wellbeing
of this workforce?
I think there are a number of,of areas.
I mean, first there's, there'sthe empowerment of workers.
We know that if workers feelthey can have some influence
over their work situation, thatthey are much happier than if
(42:53):
it's just dictated from above.
And they've been really goodexperiments like the, uh,
so-called STAR experiment, whichwas led from M I t.
Um, The, uh, system of takingdecisions about how the work is
allocated, um, within a team.
(43:14):
it's done with much more, uh,participation by the team
members, um, than had been therebefore.
And it's been evaluated.
It reduces quits by a third andso on.
It's just such an obvious way toimprove the, uh, wellbeing of
people in a team.
(43:37):
Obviously, you want the teamleaving a leader to be appointed
on basis of ability to lead.
That's not.
Uh, but common, there's been asurvey which showed that, uh,
that psychometrically, thetypical, uh, leader of the team
was not somebody who had theequalities for leading the team,
(43:59):
uh, as much as many othermembers of the team.
This is a, big issue, but thenthere's the issue of avoiding
dysfunctional things.
So a lot of pay is verydysfunctional at the moment.
Mm-hmm.
Um, if people are workingindividually, of course
(44:20):
performance related pay, whereyou can measure the individual's
output, uh, it is totallyreasonable and natural.
But if they're working in a teamwhere you can't measure the
contribution of one personcompared with another.
it's very dysfunctional to tryto import some kind of ranking
because, uh, it has the effectof hurting more people than it,
(44:47):
than it motivates and rewards.
And it's, um, also been shownnot to be, Uh, conducive to
improved productivity.
So to get away from fourthranking I think is incredibly
important.
Then of course, there's thewhole attitude to mental health.
Uh, we must have team leaderswho are comfortable saying to
(45:09):
somebody, uh, are you okay?
And if they say, well, um, Idunno really, uh, to be able to
have that conversation, to knowthat there are ways in which
people can be helped.
Encourage them to get the help,if they have to take time off to
enable'em to do it, if they needto re return afterwards
gradually to facilitate that.
(45:31):
The whole mental healthconsciousness is very important
and.
I'm really encouraged that manyorganizations are much more
mental health consciousness.
I mean, it may surprise youthat, for example, a really, uh,
um, Pioneering organization inthis field, uh, has been the
(45:54):
Bank of England Oh, wow.
You wouldn't think that issurprising.
I couldn't, I couldn't covercouple of talks there.
They've got a very flourishingmental health.
Network and everybody isabsolutely clear that this is,
it's not stigmatizing.
This is something you've gottabe able to talk about.
It happens to most people.
(46:14):
At some point.
Let's support people understandit, know that it's not the end
of their life.
If they go through it, they'llcome back the other end and, uh,
can be even better, uh, afterthat.
So, A sensible approach to, tomental health is also obviously
something which is the featureof any good workplace.
(46:36):
Wow, that's, yeah, that'stremendous.
Michael Bauman (46:39):
How do you go about, so I'm curious for you,
uh, like on the, on the kind ofquote unquote marketing side of
these things, are you marketing,quote unquote, with the
evidence, just basically showingcompanies like, you can actually
save more money, you can be moreproductive.
Is that what it, what it lookslike, or what is it?
What does it look like to Thatis
Lord Richard Layard (46:58):
exactly, exactly, exactly.
And we've only just started thisthing, uh, This summer, um, it
has a secretary in OxfordUniversity, and that's exactly
it.
That, is the sort of stuffbecoming outta it.
The other arm, as I said, uh, isthe arm to persuade governments
(47:19):
to make this, aim.
Now that has been going, I wouldsay even a bit more slowly, uh,
than with business.
I think business have become,Accustomed to talking about
wellbeing, uh, than governmentso far.
But there is a big groundswell.
So, uh, I think you couldperhaps start with messaging
(47:45):
coming from the internationalorganizations, uh, like the
European Union and the O C D in.
Asking their members to putpeople's wellbeing at the center
of their policy design.
Mm-hmm.
that, that's a big step forward.
Uh, there are five countriesthat belong to the so-called
wellbeing economy, governmentAlliance, uh, which is New
(48:08):
Zealand.
Uh, they made a splash, and ofcourse they've got another
charismatic Prime Minister byhaving a so-called wellbeing
budget.
Iceland, and uh, fin.
Uh, actually all three are womenprime ministers, which is
interesting, and so doesScotland, which is also also a
(48:29):
member of this alliance.
Um, and Wales is the fifth, but,this is step by step process.
So it's a huge step forward withwhat they've done, but they've
not got got to the point, whichI want governments to
eventually, and it'll take yearsfor this to happen where.
Instead of when you do the costbenefit analysis on the policy,
(48:51):
you ask, how does this policycontribute to, to G D P?
You're asking how does thispolicy contribute to the
wellbeing of the people?
So to, to back that up, youknow, you've got to have the
wellbeing, science and themethodology which people like
ourselves are trying to, uh,develop to the point that it can
(49:12):
be, can be used.
um, reliably by financeministries and treasuries, um,
to say how much should go ondifferent things.
Um, I mean, obviously you, youcan't allocate, um, resources
(49:32):
without some kind of anoverarching idea of what you're
trying to achieve.
And I think it, it is prettybarbarous that, the metric at
the moment is, is GDP andgrowth.
Mm-hmm.
uh, whereas it should bepeople's wellbeing.
Yeah.
Michael Bauman (49:52):
I mean, the work that you're, you're doing is
just tremendous because you areproviding those, those metrics
around it, and you're doing itin that, uh, order of a kind of
ascending, you know, ordescending priority as far as
like, let's look at mentalhealth because that makes so
much a difference with thatquestion, you know, anxiety and
depression.
So let's look at that.
(50:12):
Then let's, let's work it down,you know, the physical health.
How does the mental beginningaffect that?
The relationships, you know, andthen action for ha, happiness,
like you're talking about fromthe ground up.
But can you talk Al also about,um, as we kind of wrap up here,
can you talk about your book,um, can we be happier and one
where people can go to get it,but then also, you know, what,
(50:32):
what they'd get out of it.
I can show it.
Lord Richard Layard (50:36):
Oh, there it is.
And, and of the paper back.
I haven't got the paper backyet.
So this, um, has, uh, two parts.
the first part is actuallydiscussing some of the things
we've been discussing, thegeneral philosophy mm-hmm.
um, a and what progress hasbeen.
(50:58):
And getting, uh, businesses andgovernments to accept the
philosophy.
But this, the main part of the,um, goes through, uh,
professions who can do what.
chapter five, each of us.
That's action for happiness andthe kind of things we've talked
about, but then we go throughteachers, school teachers, we've
(51:21):
talked a bit about that.
Uh, managers, we talked a bitabout that.
Health professionals, we talkeda bit about that.
Families, we haven't talked muchabout.
Family conflict, which is one ofthe major sources of misery, of
course, or lack of a partner.
The, the both of these are, aremajor sources of misery, but I
(51:45):
am very keen that familyconflict and domestic violence,
which people do talk about now,shouldn't be thought of as
criminal justice issues.
These are health issues, mentalhealth issues, and there are
actually.
Good treatment.
A fine volume of of treatmentsfor family conflict.
(52:07):
These should be availablethrough.
The healthcare system.
Um, I think when this happenedover the next 25 years, it will
make a big difference to oursociety.
Um, and domestic violence ofcourse.
Likewise, um, I mean other veryuntreated areas incidentally,
(52:28):
uh, is addiction, which is, isquite shocking and a lot of
drying out clinic.
Then the psychological backup todeal with the underlying problem
that got the person into thecondition in the first place is,
is deplorably rare.
So, but then we, then we go intoonto communities.
(52:50):
um, community safety, peoplefeeling safe in their
communities, feeling they belongin their communities.
They know people, um, uh, haverewarding experiences, but
cities are laid out in ways thatmake people feel they belong.
All that's very important.
Then I go on to my my ownprofessional economist.
(53:13):
Politicians and then scientists.
Cause I, I do think that anyanybody who takes the Bentham
philosophy seriously, uh, and isembarking on a, a research
career, for example, I mean,they would naturally think, I
don't say everybody should, Imean, they should also of
(53:34):
course, follow their curiosity.
But I think a natural thing tosay is, you know, which, which,
what area?
Um, that I work on could makemost difference to human
wellbeing.
And so I say of course, numberone, climate change.
Mm-hmm.
um, cheap, cheap, clean energy,uh, should be attracting the,
(53:57):
the best minds in a society.
Mm-hmm.
uh, and then I say pain reliefof.
Of course, pain relief, massiveissue, uh, physical pain and
mental pain.
So many, uh, of these issuesare, are really, so deeply un
(54:18):
understudied.
Mm-hmm.
it's a matter of a general wayof thinking about everyth.
That, I'm advocating, isn't it,it's not just a little bit, it's
a total way in which you thinkabout.
Michael Bauman (54:29):
Yeah, well, there you go.
If you fall into any of thosecategories, which is everybody,
and you can be happier.
That's what I also love too,about everything that you do is
going, can we show the evidence?
Like everything is based in theevidence.
What does the evidence say andhow does this affect this arena
with whatever you're looking at,which is just phenomenal.
(54:50):
So definitely, definitely getthe book.
Where can people go to get thebook?
Where can they go?
Where would you like them to goto?
Well,
Lord Richard Layard (54:56):
I would imagine.
Amazon
Michael Bauman (54:58):
is the, is the go-to
Lord Richard Layard (55:00):
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Michael Bauman (55:03):
What about for you personally?
You like, where can they go toConnect, either with what you're
doing, and I'll put linksactually to this for the show
notes, for action, forhappiness, and if there's other
places that you want them to goto connect with you or the work
that you're doing.
Lord Richard Layard (55:18):
Um, they are welcome to write to me um,
rlayard1@gmail.com Please go to,to the Action of Happiness
website.
Mm-hmm.
if you are interested in how tohave a more purposeful, and
rewarding.
Inner life.
(55:40):
This is ultimately, of course,about the, the inner life which
motivates both what you do foryourself and what you do for
others.
Um, but also, also look out forpublic debate about wellbeing as
a proper, um, goal for forbusiness, for its workers,
(56:01):
because that will be good forthem and for the bottom line.
And also for, for governments,and I'm looking to see a, a big
change in the, the nature of thepublic debate about the world.
We want, um, a challenge, uh, Aworldwide challenge to the
(56:24):
growth fixation.
I'm not against growth.
Growth will happen.
You can't stop growth.
Uh, I mean, it is extraordinarythat nobody thought of putting
wheels onto a, um, a piece ofluggage until recently.
That's economic growth.
It'll go on forever.
Um, but the obsession, um, withgrowth r rather than the meeting
(56:49):
of human need, uh, I think issomething that really needs
challenging.
Mm-hmm.
and, uh, let's hope all of youcan contribute to this great
debate and make wellbeing thecenterpiece of that debate.
Mm.
Michael Bauman (57:05):
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Thank you so much foreverything.
I mean, I can thank you for themillions of people that you
have, you've impacted, um, inyour decades of work in this, in
this field.
So thank you so much for whatyou're doing and, and thank you
for taking the, the time heretoday.
Lord Richard Layard (57:23):
Well, it was lovely, lovely talking to
you.
And uh, thank you, uh, thank youall for listening.
Absolutely.
Michael Bauman (57:30):
Before you go, I would love it if you actually
just shared this episode with afriend.
I'm sure while you werelistening, someone just popped
in your head and you're like,oh, they would probably like
this as well.
So it's really easy.
You just click the share buttonon either the website or
whatever podcast platform you'reon and send it over to'em, and
chances are they'll probablylike it too.
Until next time, keepengineering your success.
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