The
report reflects a new worldwide demand for more attention to happiness
and absence of misery as criteria for government policy. It reviews the
state of happiness in the world today and shows how the new science of
happiness explains personal and national variations in happiness.
http://www.earth.columbia.edu/
The
happiest countries in the world are all in Northern Europe (Denmark,
Norway, Finland, Netherlands). Their average life evaluation score is
7.6 on a 0-to-10 scale. The least happy countries are all poor countries
in Sub-Saharan Africa (Togo, Benin, Central African Republic, Sierra
Leone) with average life evaluation scores of 3.4. But it is not just
wealth that makes people happy: Political freedom, strong social
networks and an absence of corruption are together more important than
income in explaining well-being differences between the top and bottom
countries. At the individual level, good mental and physical health,
someone to count on, job security and stable families are crucial.
Edited by John Helliwell, Richard Layard and Jeffrey Sachs, Earth Institute, Columbia University, 2012
No comments:
Post a Comment