On the Search for Well-Being

This book takes on one of the great questions of the day: Why are some countries enormously rich and others so heartbreakingly poor?

Henry J. Bruton organizes the discussion around three basic ideas. The first is that well-being reflects not only the availability and distribution of goods and services, but also employment, values, institutions, and quality of preferences. The second is that ignorance is ubiquitous; hence growth of well-being depends primarily on commitments to searching and...