Look at the future, the future is bright
[...] the greater a society’s future orientation, the higher its average GDP per capita and its levels of innovativeness, happiness, confidence, and (as the chart shows) competitiveness.
From the Harvard Business Review (free access), via MR.
I am not as sure as the authors about the direction the causality runs, however: rather than forward thinking leading to higher GDP per capita and all the other goodies mentioned, I suspect that worrying about the future is a luxury you can only afford once you are comfortable in the present.
