The Wellbeing Valuation Approach: The Monetary Value of Sport Participation and Volunteering for Different Life Satisfaction Measures and Estimators

Abstract

This study applies the wellbeing valuation approach to sport participation and volunteering using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel. Linear regression results show that sport and volunteering hours increase satisfaction with life, health, work, income, and leisure, but with diminishing returns in most models. In a seemingly unrelated regression, some of these effects turn insignificant. The instrumental variable estimates show causal impacts of sporting hours on all wellbeing measures, while volunteering only impacts health satisfaction. The monetary values vary depending on the type of wellbeing measure and estimator, indicating that future studies should consider the employed measures and estimators.