Friday, June 07, 2019

It seems that money CAN buy you happiness after all

The UN's Sustainable Development Solutions Network has published its latest World Happiness Report, which purports to rank the countries of the world according to the relatively simple metric of how its population rates the quality of their lives. It identifies various contributing factors to this rating, including GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity, and freedom from corruption.
The main listing can be found in Figure 2.7 of the report. As usual, the Nordic and North European countries are out there at the top: Finland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Netherlands, Switzerland, Sweden, followed by New Zealand, Canada (No. 9), Austria, and Australia. The UK comes in at No. 15 and the US at No. 19. Bhutan, which makes a big deal about how happy it's people are, languishes as No. 95 out of 156. South Sudan is No. 156.
My conclusion is that, yes, money CAN buy you happiness.

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