Based on the 2016 China Labor-force Dynamic Survey, the effect of appearance on residents’ subjective well-being and the acquired factors of education and effort were empirically examined. The result shows that better appearance can help improve residents’ subjective well-being; mechanism analysis shows that appearance affect residents’ subjective well-being by influencing job satisfaction (income satisfaction and promotion satisfaction) and life satisfaction (life choice and social network); improving the degree of education and effort helps to reduce the impact of appearance on residents’ subjective well-being. The conclusions provide new empirical evidence for the relationship between appearance and well-being, and provide new ideas based on the perspective of education and effort for residents to alleviate the “inequality” caused by their natural appearance.

appearance  /  subjective well-being  /  education  /  effort