It is a most unlikely scene. I am in an elegant sitting room in the Royal Society of Arts. Opposite me, sitting uncomfortably side-by-side on a too-low leather sofa, are an English peer and a French Buddhist monk. The contrast is striking. Lord Layard is white-haired, well-dressed and unobtrusive; the Venerable Matthieu Ricard is larger than life in flowing, burgundy robes. Yet despite their differences, these men have a common denominator: both have devoted their lives to the study of happiness.
Layard is the UK’s leading happiness economist. In his book Happiness: Lessons from a New Science , Layard — a devotee of the 18th-century Utilitarian thinker Jer-emy Bentham — argues that governments need to take their responsibilities for our happiness seriously. “We need a wider debate about what lifestyles are conducive to happiness,” he says.
“Far more public funding should be allocated to mental-health services, parenting support networks, and positive-living education in schools. Everyone is concerned with avoiding poverty, ill health, conflict and enslavement. But these things are nothing but versions of unhappiness. So what we’re all really concerned with, although we might be afraid of the simplicity of the term, is happiness.”
Philadelphia recliner sofa (Philadelphia): white recliner leather. The leather is worn in some parts. Was going to... 
recliner sofa (Philadelphia): white recliner leather. The leather is worn in some parts. Was g...