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Happiness is on the Wane in the US, UN Global Report Finds (theguardian.com)
From a report on The Guardian, shared by five anonymous readers: Happiness in the US is declining and is expected to continue on a downward path, with Donald Trump's policies forecast to deepen the country's social crisis. The US has slipped to 15th place in the World Happiness Report 2017, produced by the United Nations. The world's economic superpower is well behind top-ranked Norway, although it remains above Germany in 17th place, the UK in 19th, and France in 32nd. Norway knocked Denmark off the top spot as the world's happiest country, with Iceland and Switzerland rounding out the top four. The report's authors stress, however, that the top four are so close that changes are not statistically significant. The next tier of countries are regular leaders in international happiness surveys: Finland is in fifth place, followed by the Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and Sweden. The world's "unhappiest" countries are all in the Middle East and Africa: war-stricken Yemen and Syria feature in the bottom 10, with Tanzania, Burundi and Central African Republic making up the final three.
It's adorable that you think polls mean anything. All that tells you is what the people polled think, not what the rest of the nation thinks. I could probably find (or create) a poll that would lead you to believe that the Earth is actually flat, too, and it would have just about as much credibility.
Please visit Geneva. Because of the concentration of international organisations, it's one of the most diverse place in the World.
There is close to 1/3 of foreign living or cross-border working in Switzerland.
Switzerland certainly enjoy a stable political system in the World since 1848, and this is the most important point to me. The process of getting a new president is done every year in less than one hour without any glitch. Compare that to almost all others "democratic" counties, especially this time...
Or, maybe they just found a nice balance between capitalism and socialism, unlike the rest of the world.
For very socialist values of balance, at least here in Norway. According to the world bank we have third lowest Gini coefficient in the world, meaning our income is extremely evenly distributed by international standards. There is not a lot of really poor nor very wealthy people, with notable exceptions of course but looking at income stats if you divide into 10% slices the 80-90% slice make just under twice as much as the 10-20%. The best paid executives in Statoil, our huge mostly state owned company the CEO makes about $1.7 million a year. If you go to a similar foreign oil giant like say Schlumberger the CEO makes $18.6 million a year. Working at McD you earn ~$15/hour the first four months if you're 18-20, after that or from day one if you're older ~$18.50/hour. And you don't need health insurance or a 401(k) on top of that, the public healthcare system and public pensions are entirely adequate. Granted you can't directly compare prices, but you live okay on one "minimum wage" job. So at McD you make $35k/year and your average doctor makes $95k/year, the tax system makes the difference even less in practice. But we want it. And a very high percent of the population works, that helps. It's still an odd country.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Is that really true though? The report has an entire chapter on "The Key Determinants of Happiness and Misery", and the authors don't seem to think that multiculturalism is something that makes people sad. Why do you think that?
Japan and South Korea are probably the most culturally-homogeneous and highly-developed nations around. They sit at 51st and 56th place, respectively. Meanwhile Switzerland speaks four different languages and are the 4th happiest in the world. Canada, Australia and New Zealand, all of which are just as multicultural as the USA, are in the top 10.
I'd argue that Japan and South Korea's unhappiness comes because of, and not in spite of, their strict cultural homogeneity.