‘Finland is world’s happiest country’

FINLAND is the world’s happiest country, according to an annual survey issued on Wednesday that put Burundi at the bottom of the happiness index and found Americans were getting less happy even as their country became richer.

The UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network’s (SDSN) 2018 World Happiness Report ranked 156 countries according to their scores for things such as GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, social freedom, generosity and absence of corruption.

Finland, rose from fifth place last year to oust Norway from the top spot. The 2018 top 10, as ever dominated by the Nordics, is: Finland, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Switzerland, Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand, Sweden and Australia. The United States came in at 18th, down from 14th place last year. Britain was 19th and the United Arab Emirates 20th.

One chapter of the 170-page report is dedicated to emerging health problems such as obesity, depression and the opioid crisis, particularly in the United States where the prevalence of all three has grown faster than in most other countries.

While income per capita has increased markedly in the United States over the last half century, the happiness index has been hit by weakened social support networks, a rise in perception of corruption in government and business and declining confidence in public institutions.

“We obviously have a social crisis in the United States: more inequality, less trust, less confidence in government,” the head of the SDSN, Professor Jeffrey Sachs of New York’s Columbia University, said as the report was launched at the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy of Sciences.

“It’s pretty stark right now. The signs are not good for the US It is getting richer and richer but not getting happier.”