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(CNN) The latest report on world happiness gives cause for optimism.
For one, goodwill is about 25% higher than before the pandemic.
“Goodwill toward others, particularly helping strangers, which increased dramatically in 2021, remained high in 2022,” John Helliwell, one of the authors of the World Happiness Report, said in an interview with CNN.
And global happiness has not taken a hit in the three years of the Covid-19 pandemic. Life assessments from 2020 to 2022 have been “remarkably resilient,” the report said, with global averages broadly consistent with the three years prior to the pandemic.
“Even during these difficult years, positive emotions are twice as prevalent as negative ones, and feelings of positive social support twice as prevalent as loneliness,” Helliwell said in a press release.
The report, a publication of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, draws on global survey data from people in more than 150 countries. Countries are ranked by satisfaction based on their average life assessments over the previous three years, in this case 2020-2022.
The report, released Monday, identifies the happiest nations, those at the bottom of the happiness scale and everything in between, and the factors that tend to lead to greater happiness. March 20th is the International Day of Happiness, a day designated by the United Nations, celebrating its 10th anniversary in 2023.
Finland, pictured with Senate Square in Helsinki, is number 1 for happiness for the sixth year in a row.
Six year winning streak for the happiest nation in the world
Finland is the happiest country in the world for the sixth year in a row, according to World Happiness Report rankings, based largely on life ratings from the Gallup World Poll.
The Nordic country and its neighbors Denmark, Iceland, Sweden and Norway all score very well on the metrics the report uses to explain its findings: healthy life expectancy, GDP per capita, social support, low corruption, generosity in a community , in which people care about each other and the freedom to make important life decisions.
But since we can’t all move to Finland, can other societies learn something from these rankings?
“Is it, do they do things that we wish we had seen before and could start doing? Or is it something unique about their climate and history that makes them different? And fortunately, at least from my perspective, the answer is the earlier one,” said Helliwell, professor emeritus at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Columbia.
A holistic view of the well-being of all components of a society and its members leads to better life assessments and happier countries.
“The aim of every institution should be to contribute as much as possible to the well-being of people,” says the report, which includes accountability to future generations and respect for basic human rights.
Israel moves up to fourth place this year its No. 9 ranking last year. The Netherlands (No. 5), Switzerland (No. 8), Luxembourg (No. 9) and New Zealand (No. 10) complete the top 10.
Australia (No. 12), Canada (No. 13), Ireland (No. 14), the United States (No. 15) and the United Kingdom (No. 19) all made the top 20.
Lithuania, with the main square in Kaunas pictured, made the top 20 in the latest World Happiness Report.
While the same countries appear in the top 20 year after year, there’s a new addition this year: Lithuania.
The Baltic nation has steadily climbed from 52nd place in 2017 to 20th place on the current list over the past six years. And the other Baltic countries Estonia (31st place) and Latvia (41st place) are also climbing the ranks.
“It’s essentially the same story that’s happening in the rest of Central and Eastern Europe,” Helliwell said.
Countries in these regions “likely normalized this transition after 1990 and [are] feel more settled in their new identity,” he has said over the years.
France dropped from the top 20 to 21st in this year’s report.
Nations ranked lower for luck
At the very bottom of the list is Afghanistan at 137. Lebanon is a notch higher at 136. The average life rating in these countries is more than five points lower (on a scale of 0 to 10) than in the top 10 happiest countries .
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine put both countries in the global spotlight upon the release of the 2022 report.
Where do these two nations stand according to the latest polls?
Well-being in Ukraine has definitely taken a hit, but “despite the extent of the suffering and damage in Ukraine, life appraisals remained higher in September 2022 than after the 2014 annexation, supported now by a stronger sense of common purpose, goodwill and Trust in the Ukrainian leadership,” the report said.
According to the survey, trust in their governments had grown in both countries in 2022, “but much more so in Ukraine than in Russia”. And Ukrainian support for the leadership in Russia went to zero.
In this year’s ranking, Russia is 70th and Ukraine 92nd.
I’m looking forward to
The upheavals of the pandemic have given much food for thought.
“People are rethinking their life goals,” Helliwell said. “They say, ‘I’m going back, but where am I going back? Where do I want to return to? How do I want to spend the rest of my life?’”
He hopes that this “move towards more explicit thinking about values and other people” will influence not only factors like career or school choices, but also how they act in those environments.
“It’s not really about the grades or the salary, it’s about collaborating with other people in a meaningful way. And of course that’s good for the world, but the whole point of this happiness research is that it’s also good for the people who do it.
“In other words, you end up feeling better about actually caring about other people and not about number one.”
The happiest countries in the world for 2023
1. Finland
2. Denmark
3. Iceland
4. Israel
5. Netherlands
6. Sweden
7. Norway
8. Switzerland
9. Luxembourg
10. New Zealand
11. Austria
12. Australia
13. Canada
14. Ireland
15. United States
16. Germany
17. Belgium
18. Czech Republic
19. United Kingdom
20. Lithuania