The mainstream media does a great job of trying to demoralize people with their never-ending gloom and doom spin and joyless, life-sucking headlines and news coverage. Are things really that bad? Let’s turn to the World Happiness Report for answers. That is a publication of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network that analyzes data from 150 countries worldwide to determine the collective mood of humans globally.
It’s the 10th year the report has come out, and with the war in Ukraine and people still reeling from a two-year pandemic, you can imagine that the information might not be too optimistic.
Here’s what one of the editors of the report told CNN.
“The big surprise was that globally, in an uncoordinated way, there have been very large increases in all the three forms of benevolence that are asked about in the Gallup World Poll.”
That’s good. Benevolence is on the rise.
The report also lists the world’s happiest countries, and coming in at the top of the list is? Finland. Coming in close behind are its Nordic neighbors Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Iceland. Add Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg to the top ten, along with Israel and New Zealand.
How about North America? Canada is number 15, and the United States comes in at 16, followed by the United Kingdom. Okay, at least we are in the top 20.
Here’s another finding from the report that might not be a surprise.
“For the young, life satisfaction has fallen, while for those over 60, it has risen — with little overall change.”
The report also found that negativity has a way of balancing out positivity, and dealing with crises has a tendency to bring out the best and worst in societies.
Understandably, the country at the bottom of the list is Afghanistan, at number 146.
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