Well-being in OECD countries: an assessment of technical and social efficiency using data envelopment analysis

This paper looks at the concept of well-being from the perspective that a way of producing well-being is sustainable if it is also efficient, such being able to last over time. The paper gets its value from considering how well-being is produced and from assessing whether OECD countries are making the most of their resources or should revise their production processes. The data envelopment analysis is performed on all 37 OECD countries using the OECD Better Life Index variables with the aim of evaluating both technical and social efficiency in producing well-being. This allows both to assess how many countries are efficient in exploiting their resources and to consider social and environmental externalities as inputs and not only as an unavoidable consequence of the production process. High well-being countries are not always efficient at producing those levels of well-being. The poorest countries show the worst social efficiency scores: in the early stages of development, countries are focused on improving technical efficiency and, only later, on issues that are not merely economic, such as environmental and social costs.