They tend also to have higher wages – not because they decree wages shall be high but because welleducated, skilled workforces working with a lot of capital and modern technology are more  BIS central bankers’ speeches  5  productive. The poorest peoples usually have far less in the way of such things.
If we care about wellbeing in the broadest sense, we should care about things that affect potential output per head. Our citizens certainly care about the results. They don’t frame the question as being about per capita real GDP or productivity per hour and they care about more than just “narrow” outcomes for economic statistics. Many would be concerned to reduce our environmental footprint.