City Research Online

Abstract

This paper studies “national worry.” It finds that in the West European nations the intensity of worry seems to be inversely linked to the level of social spending in a country. We also demonstrate that the proportion of citizens in Western Europe who report extreme‐worry levels has risen steadily over the last two decades. The United Kingdom experienced the fastest increase in worry. Our country‐panel estimates point to a potentially central role for the little‐discussed ex ante psychological value of the welfare state (i.e., the benefit to the whole population, and not just the mental‐wellbeing gains going ex post to the smaller number of citizens who actually draw upon welfare‐state help). Worry levels move with other economic variables, including the unemployment rate, and we provide some of the first estimates of the patterns of worry across different kinds of individuals. Finally, the analysis is extended to the set of OECD countries. We believe that much needs to be understood about the troubling rise of worry in modern society.

Publication Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2025 The Author(s). Review of Income and Wealth published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of International Association for Research in Income and Wealth. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Publisher Keywords:	economics, GDP, mental health, progress, social spending, wellbeing
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology H Social Sciences > HB Economic Theory R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine > RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine
Departments:	School of Health & Medical Sciences School of Health & Medical Sciences > Department of Psychology & Neuroscience
SWORD Depositor:	Symplectic Administrator

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