Happiness is not just a personal issue--it is a matter of national concern. America’s founders believed that the pursuit of happiness was a measure of the effectiveness and morality of the state. Today, we know that happy people work harder, are more charitable, have better marriages, are better parents, act...

Brooks examines vast amounts of evidence and empirical research to uncover the truth about who is happy in America, who is not, and--most important--why.

If ever we need evidence of ideology run rampant, the House vote to eliminate the annual American Community Survey and the Economic Census to provide basic information on the state of businesses and industries in the country and data used for generating quarterly gross domestic product estimates is exhibit A.

In the run-up to this weekend's G-8 summit at Camp David, journalists have unfavorably compared European "austerity" with Barack Obama's economic policies.

The Federal Reserve could give banks a big incentive to expand by setting negative interest rates on their excess reserves. 

The primary drivers of our growing debt burden are the “Big 3” entitlements of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Yet as part of the debt ceiling deal that created sequestration when the Super Committee failed, politicians effectively fenced off nearly two-thirds of the federal budget and the main source of our over-spending. 

The Romney 4 percent Pentagon budget is no “spike”; it’s more like a return to normal, even very constrained military spending given the global mission of America’s armed forces.