Let us talk about — HAPPINESS

Question that may come to your mind at this point in time may possibly be:

“What countries have really achieved it and why should we care about it?”

We often talk about things such as purchasing power, trade partnership or military resources while looking at the global ranking. However, some experts said that happiness is actually a better indicator. Bina Agarwal, a professor of development economics and environment at University of Manchester stated on The New York Times, claiming that subjective indicators like happiness, capture an important dimension of well-being that could be possibly missed by objective measures.

Let us take a look at chart below, which shows the Top 10 Happiest Country in 2018 from the World Happiness Report.

Do you notice anything about the top 10?

YES! All the Nordic countries are in there. They have all ranked among the top 10 since 2015.

Now, you may want to ask what are the factors that rank Finland, Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Switzerland, the happiest countries in the world?

Economists have analyzed six major factors that contribute to the happiness scores such as GDP per capita, Life expectancy and health, Social support, Freedom to make life choices, Generosity and Perceptions of Corruption. These factors have been proven to be the most significant underlying factors among the happiest countries.

Most of the Nordic countries provide tuition-free college options, free healthcare services, etc. For example, there are generous unemployment benefits in Switzerland that allow most workers to receive 70% of their former salary up to a maximum of CHF 88,200 a year — the amount paid varies depending on circumstances. To continue receiving the benefit, one must show they are actively looking for work and file progress reports with their local employment office within strict time limits. In addition, Norway provides up to a year of full-salary paid sick leave. In Sweden, parents are entitled to almost 16 months of paid parental leave per child, while in Finland, which is the winning country in 2018, the government will provide “baby boxes” to all the new parent. The boxes are filled with things such as clothes, thermometer and slippers

Finnish Baby boxes

Another interesting insight from my analysis is “social support” tends to allow some countries to maintain high happiness ratings even when it is going through a crisis. Social support enhances the quality of life and provides a buffer against adverse life events.

In October 2008, Iceland nationalized its three largest banks. Kaupthing Bank, Landsbanki, and Glitnir Bank had defaulted on $62 billion of foreign debt. The banks’ collapse sent foreign investors out and the stock market fell. Almost every business in Iceland went bankrupt. Housing prices fell, while mortgage costs doubled. Yet, the country has successfully survived a sovereign bankruptcy due to strong social network and its happiness level still remain high.

In conclusion, though we might expect personal or national wealth to be the biggest determining factor for happiness, through my analysis, I personally think that to be a top ranked country, it is not about being really rich or about having a really good government. It is all about a combination of different factors, as mentioned earlier, that bring a significant impact to it [happiness].