Finland Named World’s Happiest Country For Fifth Time In A Row

According to findings from the 2022 World Happiness Report, Finland has continued its winning streak of five times at the top on the ten-year anniversary of the annual report. The happiness report draws on survey data from 150 countries to determine the result and is published every year by the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network.

The report’s findings are determined by several economic and social factors, including a country’s GDP per capita, healthy life expectancy, social support, community generosity in response to difficult situations, and corruption levels.

Along with Finland cementing its lead, optimistic takeaways from the report also mentioned that there has been an apparent increase in various benevolent actions around the world. “The big surprise was that globally, in an uncoordinated way, there have been very large increases in the three forms of benevolence that are asked about in the Gallup World Poll,” explained John Helliwell, one of the original editors of the report.

The three aspects of benevolence outlined in the report: donating to charity, helping a stranger, and volunteering, were apparently all up this past year, “especially the help to strangers in 2021, by a very large amount in all regions of the world,” according to Helliwell. In pure numbers, these three actions went up by about 25% globally per the report.

The top five were all European countries, with the three happiest countries of 2021 reportedly being Finland, Denmark, and Iceland respectively. Other Nordic countries like Norway, seventh, and Sweden, eighth were not far behind at all.

Israel and New Zealand rounded out the top ten as ninth and tenth and finally introduced some non-European contenders in the mix. New Zealand narrowly beat Australia, which was the twelfth spot on the list. North America eventually came into the mix with the U.S. at 15 and Canada right behind at 16.

Helliwell also spoke about average life evaluations provided by survey participants. even though on average they leveled, he spoke that there were differing opinions based on age. “For the young, life satisfaction has fallen, while for those over 60, it has risen – with little overall change.” Even if the average is level, rising negativity among younger generations definitely seems inevitable and concerning.

Even though this report’s data consists of survey results before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, both countries fell in the Happiness rankings. Russia was 80 on the list, and Ukraine was even further down at 98. The lowest ranking country in the report was Afghanistan at 146. One editor of the report, Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, said the result is “a stark reminder of the material and immaterial damage that war does to its many victims.”

With both encouraging and worrying results from this year’s World Happiness Report, it remains to be seen what the results will be going forward into the new year.