Beyond Income: The Importance for Life Satisfaction of Having Access to a Cash Margin

We study how life satisfaction among adult Swedes is influenced by having access to a cash margin, i.e. a moderate amount of money that could be acquired on short notice either through own savings, by loan from family or friends, or by other means. We find that cash margin is a strong and robust predictor of life satisfaction, also when controlling for individual fixed-effects and socio-economic conditions, including income. Since it shows not to matter whether cash margin comes from own savings or with help from family members, this measure captures something beyond wealth.