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This paper attempts to explain international and inter-personal differences in subjective well-being over the final fifth of the twentieth century. The empirical work makes use of data from three waves of the World Values survey covering about fifty different countries. The analysis proceeds in stages. First there is a brief review of some reasons for giving a key role to subjective measures of well-being. This is followed by a survey of earlier empirical studies, a description of the main variables used, a report of results and tests, and discussion of the links among social capital, education, income and well-being. The main innovation of the paper, relative to earlier studies of subjective well-being, lies in its use of large international samples of data combining individual and societal level variables, thus permitting the simultaneous identification of individual-level and societal-level determinants of well-being. This is particularly useful in identifying the direct and indirect linkages between social capital and well-being.

This paper describes the structure of INTERMOD, a linked international model constructed at the Department of Finance using annual data. Our model follows closely the structure of a policy simulation model developed at the IMF (MULTIMOD), which employs a highly aggregated and common structure for each of the industrial countries. The most important difference is that INTERMOD has separate blocks for each of the G7 countries whereas MULTIMOD aggregates the four smaller countries (France, the UK, Italy and Canada) into a single region. Our discussion of the structure of INTERMOD focuses on the relationship between consumption and wealth, the role of fiscal policy in influencing aggregate demand, the specification of international linkages and the modelling of expectations. This is followed by a comparison of simulation results for INTERMOD, MULTIMOD and other linked international models. Operation of the model in a PC environment is then described. The paper concludes with a discussion of possible policy applications and avenues for further development. A detailed listing of simulation results and the model structure is provided in an appendix to the paper.

This paper describes MACE, a two sector annual nacroeconometric model of the Canadian economy. The sectoral breakdown highlights the role of energy in a small open economy. In addition, the model emphasizes the supply side, which includes both the evolution of normal output and the determination of the level of current output as the consequence of an explicit operating rate decision by firms. The bulk of the paper outlines the approach used to model supply side considerations, since this is where most of the model's innovative features lie.