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The World Happiness Report is beset with methodological problems
oriettaxx wrote 11 hours 46 min ago:
and we are definitively not happy about it
JimmyJamesJames wrote 15 hours 6 min ago:
I think what you think makes you happy is beset with methodological
problems.
Wealth, Rich, Successful are words cited as common “better life” in
the blog, but that’s simply not true as the World Happiness Report
demonstrates.
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Same issue I have... The Nordic countries have high rates of alcoholism
and depression (partly due to low sunlight in winter). They do or did
have some things right, but it is questionable whether those still
exist. Why are they continually claimed as happy?
looperhacks wrote 1 day ago:
Does anybody take the World Happiness Report that serious? I think it's
a neat and funny thing that probably has some footing in reality, but I
never thought of it as hard science.
kjuulh wrote 1 day ago:
From the provided question by WHR I can definitely see how Scandinavian
countries rank so high. Being Danish myself my answer would immediately
go into long term thinking and whether I would have a better life
elsewhere and to me the answer is a clear no. Not financially, socially
or politically. So yes, Denmark scores really high, but is it really
measuring happiness. I dont know. That said I dont think measuring how
often we laugh as a better metric amongst other thing, I can be
perfectly "happy" without being outwardly joyous, maybe contentment is
a better word. Or well being. But it isn't as catchy i guess
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Denmark is probably the best out of these countries in terms of
winter (excluding Greenland and the Faroes), but the others get very
little sunlight in winter, and have historical alcohol problems.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Hmm perhaps US Declaration of Independence could have cited "certain
unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the
pursuit of Contentment".
flexie wrote 1 day ago:
The Substack post takes a rather childish approach by confusing
happiness with smiling and laughter.
Personal safety, good health, financial stability, access to education,
job security, low stress, and strong family and social ties do not
necessarily make people smile or laugh. They create a sense of
contentment. That is precisely where Scandinavian countries excel.
phyzix5761 wrote 1 day ago:
I agree but does the happiness report actually measure all of that
with their single question:
Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from zero at the bottom
to
ten at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder represents
the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder
represents
the worst possible life for you. If the top step is 10 and the bottom
step is 0, on which step of the ladder do you feel you personally
stand at the present time?
williamdclt wrote 1 day ago:
Yes? "The best possible life" covers pretty much exactly these
socioeconomic factors for most people. Is there any of these
factors that you think is not covered by this question?
Hamuko wrote 1 day ago:
>The happiest countries in the world are in Scandinavia; this year,
Finland is followed by Denmark, Iceland and Sweden.
Finland and Iceland are not in Scandinavia. Iceland is in fact an
island quite far removed from the peninsula.
rendall wrote 1 day ago:
There is no coherent principle that that cleanly includes Denmark,
Norway, and Sweden while excluding Finland. Not geography, language,
religion, culture or history.
Finland is not on the Scandinavian Peninsula, but it is physically
contiguous with Sweden and Norway and deeply integrated into the same
northern European ecological, economic, and transport space. If
peninsulas are the criterion, then Denmark is already a special
pleading exception.
Finland is officially bilingual, Swedish is a national language, and
Swedish is historically entrenched in Finnish administration, law,
and elites. Meanwhile Finnish is spoken by a large minority in
Sweden. So language does not draw a clean boundary.
Lutheranism dominates across Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and
Iceland.
Finnish culture is distinct in some ways, but so is Icelandic
relative to Denmark, and Norwegian relative to Swedish.
Distinctiveness exists inside the supposed core as much as between
core and periphery.
Finland was part of the Swedish realm for centuries, was governed
through the same institutions, and emerged into modernity shaped by
the same legal and administrative traditions.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
As an aside, Finns have said to me that in general Finland is open
to adopting political & economic ideas from Sweden, letting Sweden
be at the leading edge, with the caveat that first Sweden tries
them out... and IF they work they might be cribbed by Finland.
I don't know whether this attitude still prevails tho.
rendall wrote 15 hours 16 min ago:
The Nordic... or shall I say Scandinavian nations all crib from
each other. Education, family policy, labor markets, digital
government, environmental policy. Leadership just rotates
depending on the issue.
gweinberg wrote 1 day ago:
I don't understand why anyone thinks self-reported happiness scores
mean anything at all. I don't see how they possibly could. If someone
says he's a 10 on his personal scale I guess that means he can't
imagine being much happier, but I don't see how that means he's
particularly happy.
drloewi wrote 1 day ago:
The WHR is in fact profoundly flawed — but for a completely different
reason.
I read this critique when it came out, although you can really stop at
the part where he claims that it's flawed because it's self-reported.
This just totally, fundamentally, misses the point, and value, of the
study. Do you think you should decide how good your life is? Or do you
think I should decide how good your life is? Mounk appears to think he
should be the one deciding (which is what you’re doing when you
manufacture an “objective” version, rather than believing the
provided answer). This is the deeper, and fatal, problem with his
complaints. (The critique of the Ladder as being biased towards fame
and fortune sounds important, until you actually model satisfaction and
find that those variables just aren’t the dominant predictors.)
But that just means the Cantril ladder is a good outcome variable —
the WHR is in fact profoundly flawed, but the important flaws are in
the predictors they use to “explain” (their word) the outcomes.
They’re hand-picked, they’re over a decade old which is well before
the majority of their own data was collected, they’re not even
consistent with the report itself, and when they talk about them in
public (I was at the 2025 launch party), they don’t even take them
seriously, as if they know it’s not meaningful — and yet they
continue to be the single largest data product of the report, every
single year.
And this is critical. Who’s #1 is always in the headlines but Why is
far more important than Rank. We don’t really care who has the best
life — we want to know how we can get a better life. Yet most of the
predictable conversation — here, but also literally on stage at
Gallup — is just total speculation about the real answer, while
sitting in front of over 20 years of data. This is insane.
Which is why I’ve spent three years building a better model, starting
from a base of 180x more variables, and using error-driven methods of
computational variable selection instead of just deciding what I think
should make people happy — because that’s self-evidently just
inexcusably bad science. The result is measurably more accurate than
the WHR. White paper is here: [1] Tl:dr; Basic Needs, (Local and
Global) Social Support, and (Local and Global) Self-Determination
describe almost all of the findings, but many of the specific variables
that emerge as the strongest predictors are things like LGBTQ+ social
acceptance, women in white collar jobs, and meaningful, democratically
accessible political power. Which just aren’t in the WHR model. The
lessons to take, and the direction it points, are just in a profoundly
different direction.
This is the real flaw of the WHR — it doesn’t actually show us how
to make the world better.
Footnote, based on the conversation: The Cantril ladder has now been
used for literally 60 years, and new major studies continue to choose
it as their outcome measure, because 60 years of research have
demonstrated it is stable, meaningful, intuitive, and consistently
understood across languages, cultures, and geographies. Plus it’s 1.
self-reported, 2. all-encompassing, 3. single-scale, and 4.
quantitative, all of which are unavoidable properties of a usable
outcome, so even if the wording changes somewhat, any worthwhile
question is going to look, basically, like it. And yes the tangled use
of “happiness” vs “satisfaction” is stupid, misleading, and
inconsistent, but when you just accept that one is the correct version
and one is the PR version, you eventually get over it.
[1]: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5655570
drloewi wrote 1 day ago:
I read this critique when it came out, although you can really stop at
the part where he claims that it's flawed because it's self-reported.
This just totally, fundamentally, misses the point, and value, of the
study. Do you think you should decide how good your life is? Or do you
think I should decide how good your life is? Mounk appears to think he
should be the one deciding. This is the deeper, and fatal, problem with
his complaints.
But that just means the Cantril ladder is a good outcome variable —
the WHR is in fact profoundly flawed, but the important flaws are in
the predictors they use to “explain” (their word) the outcomes.
They’re hand-picked, they’re over a decade old which is well before
the majority of their own data was collected, they’re not even
consistent with the report itself, and when they talk about them in
public (I was at the 2025 launch party), they don’t even take them
seriously, as if they know it’s not meaningful — and yet they
continue to be the single largest data product of the report, every
single year.
And this is critical. Who’s #1 is always in the headlines but Why is
far more important than Rank. We don’t really care who has the best
life — we want to know how we can get a better life. Yet most of the
predictable conversation — here, but also literally on stage at
Gallup — is just total speculation about the real answer, while
sitting in front of 20 years of data. This is insane.
Which is why I’ve spent three years building a better model, starting
from a base of 180x more variables, and using objective methods of
computational variable selection instead of just deciding what I think
should make people happy — because that’s self-evidently just
inexcusably bad science. The result is measurably more accurate than
the WHR. White paper is here: [1] Tl:dr; Basic Needs, (Local and
Global) Social Support, and (Local and Global) Self-Determination
describe almost all of the findings, but many of the specific variables
that emerge as the strongest predictors are things like LGBTQ+ social
acceptance, women in white collar jobs, and meaningful, democratically
accessible political power. Which just aren’t in the WHR model. The
lessons to take, and the direction it points, are just in a profoundly
different direction.
This is the real flaw of the WHR — it doesn’t actually show us how
to make the world better.
Footnote: The Cantril ladder has now been used for literally 60 years,
and new major studies continue to choose it as their outcome measure,
because 60 years of research have demonstrated it is stable,
meaningful, intuitive, and consistently understood across languages,
cultures, and geographies. Plus it’s 1. self-reported, 2.
all-encompassing, 3. single-scale, and 4. quantitative, all of which
are unavoidable properties of a usable outcome, so even if the wording
changes somewhat, any worthwhile question is going to look, basically,
like it. And yes the tangled use of “happiness” vs
“satisfaction” is stupid, misleading, and inconsistent, but when
you just accept that one is the correct version and one is the PR
version, you eventually get over it.
[1]: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=5655570
foobar1962 wrote 1 day ago:
> ..the top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and
the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you...
on which step of the ladder do you feel you personally stand at the
present time?
10, I'm living my best possible life. It's conceivable that my "best
possible life" may not be as happy as the lifes of other people, but I
have achieved the maximum that's possible for me.
Any other "possible life" would require some combination of different
genes, being in a different place and living at a different time.
bluGill wrote 1 day ago:
I see a high mark as a sign you lack the ability to dream. I can
imangine living in a mansion with my own personal hockey rink, and
dozens of other weird luxuries that I could never afford (and
realistically wouldn't use often if at all). Just the difference
between that dream and my normal suburban house lowers me to a three.
I can think of lots of non house things my best possible life would
have - not all are even physically possible and many others are not
moral (a few dozen wives who are devoted only to me)
foobar1962 wrote 1 day ago:
Really? Satisfied people lack the ability to dream?
bluGill wrote 1 day ago:
They dream, but it is a different type of dream.
didgetmaster wrote 1 day ago:
There is an old saying that you are as happy as you choose to be. While
some people have experienced very challenging circumstances and have
trouble feeling happy; most miserable people are that way because they
let little things get in the way of their happiness.
There are rich, healthy, popular people who feel awful. They might feel
like a failure because they are constantly comparing themselves with
more successful people (or at least believe all the wonderful posts on
social media). They might immerse themselves in negative thoughts about
the world and their own immediate surroundings.
But if you are always counting your blessings and trying to serve
people who are less fortunate; you might realize that 'It's a Wonderful
Life'.
screye wrote 1 day ago:
There are no material conditions that would convince me to live in a
cold, dark and culturally introverted place. Anecdotally, my tropical
peers agree with this opinion. Seasonal affective disorder plays an
outsized role in my ability to like a place. On the flip side, I've
heard many people describe living in warm & humid weather as torture.
My point is, aggregating factors for happiness to find the best country
is like aggregating people's favorite colors to find the best color.
Each individual's needs and circumstances are unique, and what will
make them happy will vary widely as those needs and circumstances vary.
Some interesting (suspect?) findings from the quoted 2023 paper: (2008
- 2017 data)
* Somaliland had the 4th least worries
* Russians were the 7th least angry
* Chinese were the 8th best rested
* Icelanders did great on every metric, but felt very tired (rank 190)
* Venezuelans smiled the 12th most (Panama, Paraguay, Costa Rica did
even better)
* Laotians smile the 3rd most, but are also among the angriest (202)
!!?
typs wrote 1 day ago:
I grew up in a very warm place, then moved to a very cold place and
was miserable. I’d never done a winter and every year I was deeply
unhappy for huge spans of the year.
But then I moved to Denmark from that cold place and found myself
very happy! Of course circumstances change and a single account means
little but I definitely believe some societies lend themselves to
greater happiness than others, even in the very developed world.
adolph wrote 1 day ago:
> Laotians smile the 3rd most, but are also among the angriest
From "Be Careful Where You Smile: Culture Shapes Judgments of
Intelligence and Honesty of Smiling Individuals"
Although numerous studies confirm that positive perceptions of
smiling
individuals seem to be universal, anecdotal evidence suggests that
in some
cultures the opposite may be true. For example, a well-known
Russian proverb
says ‘Улыбкa, бeз пpичины - Ð…
дypaчины’ (smiling with no reason is a
sign of stupidity). The Norwegian government humorously explains
nuances of
Norwegian culture by indicating that when a stranger on the street
smiles at
Norwegians, they may assume that the stranger is insane
[1]: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4840223/
albumen wrote 1 day ago:
This comprehensive response/rebuttal [1] buried in the article’s
comments, by one of the authors of the World Happiness Report, is worth
reading. One of the most interesting points is how subjective
well-being indicators predict people’s voting behavior: “…in 20…
US presidential elections, subjective well-being indicators -
especially Cantril Ladder now and expected Cantril Ladder in five years
- measured on a county level predicted voting for Trump better than any
county-level economic indicator.” The unhappier people were, the more
likely they voted for Trump.
Also, it links to a report on why Nordic countries tend to perform so
well on life evaluation indicators: “ the most prominent explanations
include factors related to the quality of institutions, such as
reliable and extensive welfare benefits, low corruption, and
well-functioning democracy and state institutions. Furthermore, Nordic
citizens experience a high sense of autonomy and freedom, as well as
high levels of social trust towards each other, which play an important
role in determining life satisfaction. On the other hand, we show that
a few popular explanations for Nordic happiness such as the small
population and homogeneity of the Nordic countries, and a few
counterarguments against Nordic happiness such as the cold weather and
the suicide rates, actually don’t seem to have much to do with Nordic
happiness.”
[1]: https://open.substack.com/pub/yaschamounk/p/the-world-happines...
owenversteeg wrote 1 day ago:
I can't stand the conflation of "satisfied" and "happy." It's insane.
There is more happiness in one Zimbabwean (country "happiness" rank:
143) than in one hundred Icelanders (country "happiness" rank: 2,
worldwide antidepressant consumption rank: 1.) Go stand in a crowd of
people and count the fucking smiles and the fucking laughter.
It is all part of this broader wave of newspeak. If you can quite
literally redefine happiness, you can redefine anything. Nothing has
meaning anymore. You will live alone, you will consume antidepressants,
you will be protected from the sunlight, you will not smile, you will
not laugh, and you will be happy.
lioeters wrote 1 day ago:
This hits the nail on the head. The happiest people I've met in my
life, and I've been literally around the world, are in some of the
poorest "developing" countries. Their basic needs were met, food and
shelter, at least for the day. But they didn't have much more, except
their friends, family, and the nature around them - forests, rivers,
mountains and ocean.
The saddest people I've seen were in the richest countries, like the
U.S. and Germany. Yes, the homeless population, I've met them too -
but more surprisingly, the wealthy ruling class. They've conquered
the land, covered it with concrete and asphalt, colonized their own
public, produce and broadcast mass media entertainment, and command
the largest militaries. Yet their culture has clearly devolved and
degenerated, propped up by drugs, cosmetic surgery, nice clothes,
nice houses, nice cars. But it's not enough to fill that emptiness
inside.
It's a simplification of course, there are many very miserable poor
people, that's the base majority of humanity, on whom the pyramid of
modern civilization is built. But I have no respect for those at the
top, the self-styled kings of today. They're deeply unhappy people
who are not fit to lead the world, much less themselves.
arethuza wrote 1 day ago:
"the wealthy ruling class"
What always surprises me is that a lot of the most comfortably well
off people in the US, and a lesser extend the UK, seem to live in a
state of perennial fear.
deaux wrote 1 day ago:
I agree. I'm interested to hear other's thoughts on happiness without
contention vs contention without happiness. To me, the former "feels"
preferable, but I'm not sure whether it actually is.
nitwit005 wrote 1 day ago:
I just can't feel confident in any form of self report. In a world
where people have difficulty getting their spouses and children to talk
honestly about their feelings, how well do we think a survey can do?
It varies wildly by culture, but we're all conditioned somewhat to
falsely report our feelings. I don't expect an honest answer if I greet
someone with "How are you doing?".
SiempreViernes wrote 1 day ago:
> I just can't feel confident in any form of self report
How do you decide what to eat when you are out with friends if asking
them for their opinion is out?
Or do you ask but then spend all night afterwards worrying that maybe
they lied and you should have gone for tacos instead?
Seems exhausting, why not trust people a little?
nitwit005 wrote 1 day ago:
People admit they lie on surveys. There have, somewhat ironically,
been surveys about this: [1] I'm afraid struggles with dishonesty
about what they want to eat is a somewhat common relationship
problem:
[1]: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-29206289
[2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/sydaj0...
levocardia wrote 1 day ago:
>At a minimum, you would expect the happiest countries in the world to
have some of the lowest incidences of adverse mental health outcomes.
But it turns out that the residents of the same Scandinavian countries
that the press dutifully celebrates for their supposed happiness are
especially likely to take antidepressants or even to commit suicide.
"Ecological fallacy! Ecological fallacy!," I screamed, flapping my arms
pointlessly at my laptop.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_fallacy#Individual_an...
logifail wrote 1 day ago:
> To put it bluntly, it is a sham
I suspect there may be a pattern, every time I hear on the radio that
it's "World $x Day" I'm afraid I start wondering who's actually behind
that specific press release and/or what funding and incentives are
really in play...
rdtsc wrote 1 day ago:
> At a minimum, you would expect the happiest countries in the world to
have some of the lowest incidences of adverse mental health outcomes.
But it turns out that the residents of the same Scandinavian countries
that the press dutifully celebrates for their supposed happiness are
especially likely to take antidepressants or even to commit suicide.
Exactly. WHR is a wonderful tool to study how policy institutes and
media work together to build a narrative over the years.
> “Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from zero at the
bottom to ten at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder
represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder
represents the worst possible life for you. If the top step is 10 and
the bottom step is 0, on which step of the ladder do you feel you
personally stand at the present time?”
One issue identified in the article that in some countries that really
isn't taken to mean happiness, it's taken to mean "wealth". My take is
simple that someone locked in a cage for the rest of their life without
a chance to escape can still confidently put a 10 down. The cage may
very well be golden, so it doesn't say much about their absolute
happiness or suffering so to speak. Another situation is a person who
sees more achievable opportunity - "if I can do x, y, z, I'll be higher
on the ladder". Then they'd report themselves low, because they see a
path to reach higher. But in the report they'll just look like the
saddest person ever.
jampekka wrote 1 day ago:
The World Happiness Report extensively discusses positive and negative
affect in Chapter 2 and the relatively high suicide/death of despair
rates of the Nordic countries in Chapter 6. These seem to be totally
ignored in TFA. [1]
[1]: https://www.worldhappiness.report/ed/2025/caring-and-sharing-g...
[2]: https://www.worldhappiness.report/ed/2025/supporting-others-ho...
paulsutter wrote 1 day ago:
Normalizing for language and culture seem like the hardest parts of any
global survey. How are the translations done of that one question and
are there any cultural implications?
zkmon wrote 1 day ago:
Unless it includes Sentinel islands, I'm not going to spend any reading
minutes on those reports.
marifjeren wrote 1 day ago:
The only problem the author points out is that he doesn't like the
Cantril Ladder question.
I get it if you feel like that question falls short of representing
your own personal concept of happiness, but that question is the
standard in positive psychology research for measuring self reported
subjective well being, and hardly enough to say the report is "beset
with methodological problems".
imgabe wrote 1 day ago:
They give several well-considered criticisms of the question - it
leads people to focus on socioecomonic status, it doesn't correlate
with other measure like whether they report experiencing joy
recently, etc. It's not much of a defense to simply say "well, it's
the standard".
marifjeren wrote 1 day ago:
My criticism is about how the dramatic language differs from the
banal content of the article.
Titling it "The World Happiness Report Is a Sham" and calling it
"beset with methodological problems", I would expect some more
serious scientific malpractices, like data fabrication, calculation
errors, sampling problems, p-hacking, etc., not "I think there are
some problems with this variable".
deaux wrote 1 day ago:
Disagree. Whether I'm entirely fabricating data that claims A by
writing numbers into an Excel sheet, or whether I'm doing a
survey that measures B and then claim it means A, isn't
materially different in outcome. The outcomes are just as bad,
and that's what people care about. Maybe you as a researcher care
that the former is more immoral, but to everyone else it doesn't
matter.
nxobject wrote 19 hours 51 min ago:
I think there's a difference in outcomes between fabricating
data, and getting data that still remains validly gathered, but
measures something subtly different.
And I think the general public can make meaning of that
difference and have a stake in both – in the same way that
the general public knows that stock market values and economic
security are different things, even though people still have a
lot riding on retirement plans based on stock investments.
jltsiren wrote 1 day ago:
Is joy related to happiness, or are they two separate concepts?
That depends on your cultural background and the languages you
speak.
The World Happiness Report can be traced back to the UN General
Assembly Resolution 65/309, which was proposed by Bhutan. Therefore
the intended definition of happiness in this context is similar to
the one in Bhutan's Gross National Happiness index.
notahacker wrote 1 day ago:
The more practical problem is that the samples used in the Gallup
World Poll are for largely unavoidable reasons small and not
representative of entire country demographics; in particular
respondents can skew richer and more educated than their national
average in poorer countries.
PLMUV9A4UP27D wrote 1 day ago:
A Finn here. And just as many other finns, I'm confused to why Finland
ranks at the top.
Yet, this seems like a case of someone looking to disprove a theory and
thus finds the arguments. For example;
Health metrics isn't a good measure, considering that Scandinavia has
free health care, and this leads to more cases of mental health issues
are recorded.
Suicides aren't a great metric either, considering that Swedes and
Finns have fairly high level of access to guns.
I do agree that happiness is a term that is difficult to define, and
that "happiness" is a bit misleading. "Content" is a better
description.
Also, I think it's easy to misunderstand the Finns from the surface of
us. We don't exhibit happiness, and we don't express happiness in a way
that is easily observed. Finland ranks at the top of trust in other
people, and being one of the least corrupt countries in the world.
Those two metrics are a hint into how we Finns relate to other people.
Also, it's difficult to get to know Finns, and for this reason it's
difficult for outsiders to understand the Finns and the mentality.
On the anecdotal side, earlier this year I solo-traveled the US for 4
weeks, and out of those I got into deeper conversations, I was struck
by how sad people were. That made me more convinced that I live a very
happy life, in a happy place.
Edit: Some references:
Weapons per capita: [1] Corruption index: [2] Trust in others:
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estimated_number_of_civilian_gun...
[2]: https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2024
[3]: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-where-people-trust-eac...
arethuza wrote 1 day ago:
"We don't exhibit happiness, and we don't express happiness in a way
that is easily observed"
I would far rather live somewhere where people look unhappy but are
actually pretty content with life than somewhere where people feel
compelled to look happy even though they are actually feeling pretty
miserable.
But then again I am an aging Scot so I'm biased. ;-)
Edit: I'm also just back from a visit to Finland.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
As a Murrcan greybeard now having lived more than half my life in
Finland, I agree with your second-paragraph observations on the
people and the mentality.
The level of societal trust here is still very high. I say "still"
because methinks Western media and social media serve to erode such
things. My 0.01€, YMMV.
cosmic_cheese wrote 1 day ago:
That fuzzy line that sits between happiness and contentment is worth
some exploration. For some the two are one and the same but for
others “happiness” represents something closer to a perpetual
Disney-movie-good-ending sort of emotional state that I suspect is
broadly speaking unrealistic. I wonder how much sadness has stemmed
from chasing that unattainable ideal.
PLMUV9A4UP27D wrote 1 day ago:
You have a good point. I was about to write something about that in
my previous point, like "Finns have a ladder that is lowers than
others", but it didn't sound right. You put it with better words.
bflesch wrote 1 day ago:
Also regarding "comparison of suicide numbers", in many religious
regions suicide is a problem for your soul and therefore a problem
for your still-living relatives.
So there is a huge incentive for religious societies to let a family
member's suicide appear like an accident. Suicide rates are an
extension of mental health disease rates and extremely hard to
compare without correcting for many factors.
estomagordo wrote 1 day ago:
The author would do well to educate themselves on the difference
between Scandinavia and the Nordics.
rendall wrote 1 day ago:
Addressed here:
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46298857
oldestofsports wrote 1 day ago:
It doesn’t matter. Finland is often included when talking about
Scandinavia, which in modern days just makes sense culturally.
There’s no value in trying to cling to the ”histprically
correct” meaning of a particular term. Languages evolve,
dictionaries change.
estomagordo wrote 1 day ago:
"evolve" meaning "diluted because lots of people are dumb"
oldestofsports wrote 12 hours 27 min ago:
That mindset will make you a grumpy old soul. Language is
dynamic, not something you can force upon people. From every
mouth to ear (or screen to eye) the word is interpreted slightly
different.
I mean the original meaning of the word Scandinavia certainly
doesnt make sense anymore:
1765, from Late Latin Scandinavia (Pliny), Skandinovia (Pomponius
Mela), name of a large and fruitful island vaguely located in
northern Europe, a mistake (with unetymological -n-) for
Scadinavia, which is from a Germanic source (compare Old English
Scedenig, Old Norse Skaney "south end of Sweden"), from
Proto-Germanic skadinaujo "Scadia island." The first element is
of uncertain origin; the second element is from aujo "thing on
the water" (from PIE root *akwā- "water;" see aqua-). It might
have been an island when the word was formed; the coastlines and
drainage of the Baltic Sea changed dramatically after the melting
of the ice caps.
dosinga wrote 1 day ago:
I don't know. The World Happiness Report relies on one simple question,
which is easy to criticise but at least it applies a clear and
consistent method. The paper referred to does not. It uses a special US
dataset for states and a much smaller global dataset for every other
country, then treats the results as if they measure the same thing.
This setup almost guarantees that US states look unusually good. The
authors present this as evidence, but it mostly reflects differences in
survey design rather than real differences in wellbeing. In that sense
the methodological problems here are more serious than the ones they
point to in the World Happiness Report.
testing22321 wrote 15 hours 10 min ago:
The US never gets a single city in the top 50 “world’s most
livable cities” ranking.
Lousy public transport, bankrupting healthcare and education, mass
shootings, traffic, pollution.
Nobody is fooled into thinking Americans are happy.
VonGuard wrote 15 hours 45 min ago:
Imagine that, the United States is attempting to pervert truth into
utter and complete lies. It's almost as if this is the only brand the
United States has left.
At this point in my life if I see something with United States looks
good compared to the rest of the world I just immediately assume it
is a lie. Because the United States is nothing but lies and greed
anymore. We cannot even claim innovation as a central motivator
anymore.
Sam6late wrote 1 day ago:
I would like to rewrite it, replacing desires with hormones, since
they are the drivers for desires, when young one could jump a wall,
risking his/her life to see the one we desire, then in their fifties
on a nude beach everybody looks and feels mundane.
The defining experience of our age seems to be biochemical hunger.
We're flooded with hormones that tell us to crave more, even when we
already have more than we need.
We're starved for balance while stimuli multiply around us.
Our dopamine peaks and crashes without reason; our cortisol hums in
the background like faulty wiring.
We live with a near-universal imbalance: the reign of thin hormones.
These thin hormones promise satisfaction but never deliver. They
spike and vanish, leaving behind only the impulse to chase the next
hit.
Philosophers once spoke of desires that change the self; today, our
neurochemistry is being short-circuited before the self even enters
the conversation.
A thick hormone is slower, steadier. It reshapes you in the process
of living it—like the oxytocin that comes from trust, or the
endorphins that build with persistence.
But thin hormones—those dopamine flickers from notifications,
likes, and swipes—do nothing but reproduce themselves.
They deliver sensation without transformation, stimulation without
growth.
Modern systems have perfected the art of hijacking our endocrine
circuitry.
Social media fires the neurons of connection without the chemistry of
friendship.
Porn delivers the hormonal spike of intimacy without the
vulnerability that generates oxytocin.
Productivity apps grant the dopamine signature of accomplishment with
nothing actually achieved.
We’ve built an economy not of meaning, but of molecules.
And none of it seems to be making us more alive.
darth_avocado wrote 1 day ago:
I am yet to be convinced that 4000 data points are sufficient to
extrapolate how happy 2.8B people are in the world. (India and China)
Especially when it deals with a complex topic as happiness without
taking any cultural differences into account.
People on HN tend to argue it’s sufficient data to be statistically
significant, but I don’t see how.
stickfigure wrote 1 day ago:
"Pick a random number between 1 and 10" is also a clear and
consistent method, and also not particularly meaningful.
The point I took from the article is that we should stop paying
attention to this meaningless metric. I didn't read it as a request
to replace it with another metric.
kansface wrote 1 day ago:
> I don't know. The World Happiness Report relies on one simple
question, which is easy to criticise but at least it applies a clear
and consistent method.
The simplicity is nice, but for the (probable) fact that suicide
attempts/rates and emigration don't correspond... so lets not call it
happiness.
Karrot_Kream wrote 1 day ago:
The substack references Nilsson et al [1] in regards to criticisms of
the Cantril Ladder. It's a pretty easy to read paper so I highly
suggest just reading it.
[1]
[1]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-52939-y.pdf
Natsu wrote 1 day ago:
> In that sense the methodological problems here are more serious
than the ones they point to in the World Happiness Report.
It's a simple question, sure, but it's not clear that it's a very
meaningful one, even if other approaches aren't necessarily any
better. When I think of the word happiness, I don't exactly
associate it with suicide or rarely smiling.
rkagerer wrote 1 day ago:
In case others are wondering what the one simple question is (called
the Cantril Ladder):
“Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from zero at the
bottom to ten at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder
represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the
ladder represents the worst possible life for you. If the top step is
10 and the bottom step is 0, on which step of the ladder do you feel
you personally stand at the present time?”
Personally feels a little more convoluted than just asking "How happy
are you, on a scale of 0-10?"
connorshinn wrote 1 day ago:
One possible flaw in this question - I really don't like heights,
so the idea of being at the top of a ladder does NOT equate to
being happy for me.
Now I know it's a metaphor and not a literal ladder, but it does
make me wonder if that association skews the results at all..
IAmBroom wrote 15 hours 13 min ago:
Yes, I expect to hear a scale like this expressed as "where 10 is
the best and 0 is the worst".
crimsoneer wrote 1 day ago:
I'm assuming part of this is it's not always asked in English...?
arjie wrote 1 day ago:
What an interesting question. It would seem intuitively that a
population with a limited band of socioeconomic mobility must
answer 10 and one with a wide band of mobility must answer 0. I
wonder whether that is true.
Doxin wrote 3 hours 47 min ago:
As far as I can tell happiness is relative in any case, I'm not
sure that accounting for that in the question is a bad thing.
M95D wrote 3 hours 47 min ago:
And yet, highest rating countries also have good socioeconomic
mobility.
Socioeconomic mobility isn't the only thing that affects
happiness. A good wife/husband contributes a lot to happiness,
for example.
bossyTeacher wrote 1 day ago:
>"How happy are you, on a scale of 0-10?"
Your question is likely to be interpreted as you asking the
person's current MOOD hence different answers on different times
are likely. While you are thinking of a less changing wider
concept.
The social context is important too, there is a social stigma
around admitting that you are not happy which will play into this
question too.
scotty79 wrote 1 day ago:
If I feel hopeless, I might think that I live best possible life
for me (and answer 10) despite feeling deeply unhappy about it.
Aperocky wrote 1 day ago:
Happy have so many definition that I like the question better, it
is much less ambiguous than "happy".
My happiness changes depending on many external factor and varies
by hour and days, but the answer to the former question aren't
going to change quite as often, would have probably provided the
same answer over the entire year.
greygoo222 wrote 1 day ago:
That's a necessary feature. The best translation of "happy" in
different countries can have very different connotations.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
That's why the ladder idea seems good: relatively
mistranslation-proof.
For Finland, discussion seems to hinge on whether "happiness" is
"close enough" to "contentedness".
yencabulator wrote 1 day ago:
I'm a Finn. I personally interpret that survey as Finland being
the least unhappy place. There's a social safety net, health
care is taken care of, you know your life won't get destroyed
by the slightest misfortune, you get a good education for free,
your surroundings are generally safe and well maintained, you
feel safe & are fairly certain nothing bad will happen, there
are people around you who share your values, life is good.
Things that for example the article author's favorite USA does
not have. But of course a Murkin' can't accept that. I fully
expect him to gripe that somehow the Corruption Perceptions
Index is also somehow unfair to his favorite country too, and
just cannot be right.
You had me at blaming "elites".
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Kind of a "Minimax" interpretation. Whereas in the USA, when
you hit bottom it's so low that you probably ain't comin' up
again.
tobr wrote 1 day ago:
I have to say, I don’t understand what ”for you” means in
”best/worst possible life for you”. At first I read it roughly
as ”given the fundamental unchanging circumstances of your life,
such as where and when you were born, who your parents are, and
your basic health” but maybe they mean something like ”in your
subjective perspective on what is good/bad”?
nhaehnle wrote 1 day ago:
My thought as well, but the question is: does it matter for what
the survey is trying to achieve?
Some people will interpret it one way, some a subtly different
way, but is there a reason that people's interpretation changes
over time in a way that is more rapid and more significant than
the underlying question of how good their life is broadly?
Probably not.
There may be cultural differences that make it tricky to do
comparisons between cultures / countries, but it should give
something useful when looking at the same culture / country over
time.
staticman2 wrote 1 day ago:
I'm not a psychology expert but from stuff I read I bet the reason
they don't ask "How happy are you, on a scale of 0-10?" is they
tried that and found the same person would give different answers
from day to day and moment to moment based on what is going on this
very minute.
I'd also bet that they found the above "convoluted" question was
one that led to the same people giving more consistent answers from
day to day and moment to moment.
Even if I'm wrong I hope you see this is a much thornier problem
than just asking a question and assuming the answer tells us
anything about the person taking the survey.
M95D wrote 3 hours 52 min ago:
It's the "best possible life for you" part of the question that
makes all the difference.
quitit wrote 1 day ago:
It's easy to overlook the importance in outlining a process for
evaluating each rung in the ladder.
Adding this nuance to the question serves to invite deeper
thought and avoid assigning a motivation-based rating (like when
you give the Uber driver 5 stars when what you felt was actually
just "satisfactory").
A more basic rating question can invite other kinds of influence,
such as a motivation in how they'd like their life to be
perceived rather than how they genuinely feel it to be.
In surveys with less nuance the data tends to correlate around
the extremes.
levocardia wrote 1 day ago:
I have done survey methodology research and fully agree, almost
assuredly when you see questions worded in a seemingly
"convoluted" way like this, the reason is that there was
exhaustive research that found this wording was the best balance
of reliability and validity.
There is also a lot of value in a question that works well
enough, that you ask consistently over long stretches of time (or
long stretches of distance). Maybe it's not perfect, but the
longitudinal data would be worthless if they updated the wording
every single year.
nxobject wrote 19 hours 55 min ago:
I agree – I'm sure social psychologists and psychometricians
have been thinking about this since forever, probably since
even the dawn of modern psychometrics. Cross-cultural and
cross-language validity would likely be particularly
problematic with something more detailed, especially once you
get entangled with things like how anger is expressed and
conceptualized, the role of positive outer expressions of
affect like smiling, etc.
rolandog wrote 1 day ago:
Agreed!
Although I'm no survey expert, the thing I'd like to bring to
everyone's attention is how easy it is to not take into account
people that have a degree of numeric or math illiteracy...
which I guess they are the main target demographic that is
included by these questions (and I can also guess that they
make a worryingly large part of the demographic, because our
systems are rarely inclusive).
In my experience, having met people from multiple countries
during the time I've been living abroad, what I have noticed is
that — in this world filled with inequality — it is a
privilege to be able to have a good grasp in scientific
subjects. And, for lots of different factors, people have
setbacks or trauma that make it difficult to learn a subject
that is either boring or painful to them.
So, yes the questions are a bit convoluted, but they help paint
a mental image for probably the majority with a thing that they
may be closely familiar with: stairs... Plus, it probably helps
statisticians get a better signal to noise out of the
questions, too.
seizethecheese wrote 1 day ago:
But it needs to be convoluted. The problem with the simpler version
is the word happy needs to be translated both culturally and more
literally.
notahacker wrote 1 day ago:
Yep. There are some implicit cultural expectations around "best
possible life" which vary from country to country, but it's not
quite as much a "is the word in your local language we've
rendered as happy closer in meaning to satisfied or ecstatic?"
question, and it's also less about short term emotions on the day
of the survey and much more about satisfaction with life
opportunities, which is generally more relevant for international
and longitudinal comparisons...
a_victorp wrote 1 day ago:
Came to say the same thing. The author criticizes the happiness
report methodology than immediately cites a report full of
methodological problems
awb0 wrote 1 day ago:
One way to interpret this is not as the author's endorsement of the
other report, but as a demonstration of how fragile these happiness
rankings are to perturbations in methodology / definition.
nxobject wrote 19 hours 57 min ago:
Apropos to that: I wish the author had said more about critically
evaluating tweaks in methodology and definition.
(For example, he cites Blanchflower and Bryson because he prefers
positive affect as a measurement of happiness – but doesn't
note that Blanchflower and Bryson pool data for 2008-2017, so in
terms of rankings they may be measuring something meaningful but
different.)
RamblingCTO wrote 1 day ago:
I've just had this topic with friends. How can finland and the nordics
be further up than, say, spain? Have they ever been? Sure,
materialistic safety is better up there. But the way of living, at
least in my experience, is way higher. Look at suicide rates and
alcoholism and such.
I'll spoil it:
- Finland 38
- Norway 71
- Spain 137
(fun fact: USA is 31)
ranked by suicide. If you visit it, and the vibes and feelings you have
don't match the statistics, the statistics are shit I'd say. And maybe
cities and rural areas destroy this statistic. But what do I know (but
the article agrees with me)
refurb wrote 1 day ago:
Even if the question was perfectly unbiased and captured happiness,
comparing scores from country to country are impossible because the
scale differs from country to country.
A 10 in Afghanistan is not the same as a 10 in Canada. Societies
have different perception of “the best” based on each individuals
experience, what society values and what they think is possible.
So while helpful in tracking happiness over time within the same
country, it can’t be used to compare countries.
BurningFrog wrote 1 day ago:
Note that people who commit suicide don't answer surveys anymore.
M95D wrote 3 hours 30 min ago:
People are usually unhappy for a long time before that happens.
silisili wrote 1 day ago:
Not for nothing, but I'm not sure that's a great metric. Venezuela
for instance is 178, and it doesn't seem like an overly happy place
to be these past few years.
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
In Venezuela people are told to be happy.
estomagordo wrote 1 day ago:
Using suicide rates as a measure for population happiness is very
peculiar, given that the people who commit suicide represent
fractions of a percent, and would only ever sum up to a rounding
error.
RamblingCTO wrote 1 day ago:
QoL certainly has its effect on suicide rates. I assume that life
is the shittier, the more people opt to leave on their own terms.
Just look at russia, absolute shithole and it's on rank 11.
If people are happy, you have less suicides. I don't need a study
for that.
crazygringo wrote 1 day ago:
It's not that peculiar if you assume all countries follow the same
type of happiness distribution that is simply shifted/stretched
lower or higher.
Then, the relative size of a bottom or top absolute threshold is
highly meaningful. Even if it's a fraction of a percent,
populations are huge and suicide rates are not rounding errors at
all -- they're actually quite statistically significant.
And as macabre as it is, suicides are objective facts mostly
unaffected by methodology, and unaffected by translation issues,
cultural differences, etc.
This is why suicide rates are actually a powerful mental health
statistic, just like height is a powerful physical health
statistic, at the population level. There's obviously still a lot
both of these metrics don't say, but the fact that they are highly
objective makes them extremely valuable.
williamdclt wrote 1 day ago:
> if you assume all countries follow the same type of happiness
distribution that is simply shifted/stretched lower or higher.
That's a pretty strong assumption, seems more likely that there's
variation at the extremes than not. For example, if a small
percentage of the population deals badly with extended nighttime
in long winters, then it'll affect Finland's most-unhappy stats
(and suicide rates) without meaning much for the average
happiness.
mekoka wrote 1 day ago:
I won't go into too much details on the topic, as it's loaded
with triggering elements. Let's just say that if you were to
study how different cultures apprehend and conceptualize life and
death (whether philosophically or religiously), I'm fairly sure
that you'd come out the other end questioning a lot of your
original assumptions (which I only presume you hold based on your
comment). Our collective outlook can have significant and far
reaching influence in individual decisions.
jampekka wrote 1 day ago:
The World Happiness Report discusses this:
"The large variations in the systems and processes to define
mortality causes imply there may be very different numbers of
deaths that are registered with a specific cause. This creates a
problem for cross-country comparisons of mortality by cause in
general, and even more so for deaths of despair, and suicides in
particular.
The person responsible for writing the cause of death on the
death certificate may be different across countries. In some
countries, the police are responsible, while in others a medical
doctor, coroner, or judicial investigator takes on this role.
Differences in doctors’ training, access to medical records,
and autopsy requirements contribute to these discrepancies. The
legal or judicial systems that decide causes of death also vary.
For instance, in some countries suicide is illegal and is not
listed as a classifiable cause of death, leading to
underreporting or misclassification of suicides as accidents,
violence, or deaths of “undetermined intent.”[25]
Data on suicides, even when reported, can be inaccurate due to
social factors as well. In some countries, suicide might be taboo
and highly stigmatised, so the families and friends of the person
who committed suicide might decide to misreport or not disclose
the mortality cause, causing underreporting of its incidence. In
other societies, such as Northern Europe, there is less stigma
attached to suicides, and alcohol and drug use."
[1]: https://www.worldhappiness.report/ed/2025/supporting-oth...
Karrot_Kream wrote 7 hours 32 min ago:
I don't think it would be that difficult to reconcile suicides
between G20 countries. Outside of that, sure, data collection
methods and quality heavily differ. But many people are
interested in the varying levels of happiness among the G20 and
there it doesn't seem that difficult to compare.
andreasgl wrote 1 day ago:
> And as macabre as it is, suicides are objective facts mostly
unaffected by methodology, and unaffected by translation issues,
cultural differences, etc.
I wouldn't be surprised if cultural differences are actually the
largest factor that explains a country's suicide rate. Not easy
to prove, of course, but I would be very careful drawing any
conclusions from differences in suicide rates between countries
with vastly different cultures.
I think you can also expect large differences in how countries
report their suicide rates.
BartjeD wrote 1 day ago:
Suicides are hugely affected by cultural norms. In certain Asian
cultures this has quite the history, so this can't be a correct
assumption.
Karrot_Kream wrote 1 day ago:
Most Asian cultures with suicide problems acknowledge and try
very hard to bring those rates down. It isn't just a cultural
norm and is in fact a good indicator of the happiness of a
population.
mrguyorama wrote 16 hours 19 min ago:
> It isn't just a cultural norm and is in fact a good
indicator of the happiness of a population.
Prove it
Karrot_Kream wrote 9 hours 28 min ago:
Here's [1] the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor, and
Welfare's page on preventing suicides. The motto is
誰も自殺に追い込まれる…
Ÿç¾ã‚’目指して or "Aiming for a world wher…
must deal with suicide"
[1]
[1]: https://www.mhlw.go.jp/stf/seisakunitsuite/bunya/h...
BartjeD wrote 2 hours 10 min ago:
That's a straw man; There are many cultures that have a
strong emphasis on honor/shame mechanics, which in turn
drive suicides in those cultures. And which match
cultural expectations in a grim kind of way.
The fact that people want to change their culture is
possibly an early indication of a shift, which could take
decades or centuries to actually occur. And such a
cultural shift can also lose momentum and be still-born.
---
I find counting suicides innovative. But if you do it in
a global context without looking at the cultures as
confounding factor: It's wrong.
There are many other confounding factors, such as a
forgiving national (personal) bankruptcy regime. The USA
has a pretty forgiving regime compared to other
countries. But that doesn't mean you can say it
correlates with how happy people are. Because - like
suicides - the number of people that go bankrupt might
not significantly correlate to the average happiness
rate. Because a (small) minority of people go bankrupt /
commit suicide.
It's in fact perfectly reasonable and possible to suppose
that a country with higher average suicides and harsher
penalties for bankruptcy still ends up higher on the
happiness index. Because perhaps health and
social-contact / family factors impact the rating more,
on average.
bendtb wrote 1 day ago:
There is also a religious element to suicide that cannot be
overlooked.
Also, I Spain your view of Spain is tainted. I think very few people
would choose an average city in Spain over e.g. Copenhagen where 20%
of the Danish population live.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
> There is also a religious element to suicide that cannot be
overlooked.
Also a genetic component.
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Dark winters are a bigger component here. Most Nordic countries
get little sun in winter and it gets worse the further north you
are.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Finland leads the world in per capita coffee consumption. My
pet theory is that in the winter it fights depression, and in
the summer the sun is out late at night and you're saying to
your friends: How could we possibly go to sleep now?! Moar
coffee!!
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
I tend to find coffee increases jitteriness and anxiety in
people. Some evidence it may increase depression too.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Well, maybe not so much fight depression as fight lethargy
?
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
In my experience, even that is not true. It displaces it.
socalgal2 wrote 1 day ago:
Have you eaten everyday food (not gourmet) in Copenhagen?
simonask wrote 1 day ago:
Copenhageners eat the same plastic-wrapped salads, organic
grass-fed whatever, and whatever the latest green smoothie trend
is, as in Southern California.
If this is a dig at the largely pork/cabbage/potato-based diet of
Northern Europe, you will be relieved to hear they don’t follow
it.
Source: Am one.
GoatOfAplomb wrote 1 day ago:
All the Spanish cities I've visited have looked "perfect", but
there's a lot I don't see as a tourist, e.g. that Spain has one of
the highest unemployment rates in Europe (10.5%).
PLMUV9A4UP27D wrote 1 day ago:
Finland is now close to Spain when it comes to unemployment rate!
Let's see how that affects Finland's ranking.
alephnerd wrote 1 day ago:
The perception of Spain is much more positive in the Anglophone
world - it's viewed as a country where cost of living is low, you
can nap in the middle of the day, the women/men are hot and easy,
the wine is great and cheap, and you can party late at night.
In reality the average Spaniard isn't experience the majority of
that, as those are perceptions that arose from the rose-tinted
glasses of tourists. Most tourists don't know about the Eurozone
crisis, the regional disparity, and the consolidation of Spain's
economic growth engines to 1-2 cities.
Spain is a good developed country with a decent QoL as is reflected
by it's HDI and developmental indicators (and the fact that it has
outpaced historically richer and more developed Italy is a
testament to that), but tourists almost always take a rose-tinted
view whereas locals almost always take a negative view.
And I think this is the crux of the issue with how the "World
Happiness Index" is used in American discourse - in the US almost
no one vists Europe or other parts of the World for extended
periods of time and most Americans lack familial or social ties in
Europe. As such, idealized images of Europe ("a socialist paradise"
or "white Christendom under siege") have taken hold in popular
discourse and are used as proxies for the American culture war.
phony-account wrote 1 day ago:
These measures are bullshit and often just come down to a
prevalent societal ‘temperament’ that’s inculcated from
birth.
I live and have family in Sweden and the rest of my family is in
Spain. The Swedes have immense pride in their country and pretty
much only talk about the positives. When the winters are dark,
cold, rain has been pouring for fourteen days straight and the
last time you saw sun was 4 weeks ago, they say “there’s no
bad weather just bad clothes”.
One day I sat with my cousin and some other relatives in the
olive grove of his country place in Spain - sun was shining and
we’d been eating delicious locally produced food for hours and
drinking wine from his vineyard while he yapped on about how
everything in Spain is ‘shit’ (una mierda).
And this is why places like Finland are reportedly the
‘happiest’ in the world.
pezezin wrote 1 day ago:
I am Spanish and I agree with your comment. Sadly we love to
hate our country, I guess we still have a lot of guilt
accumulated from Franco's era.
In my case, the cure was traveling and living abroad for 7
years now, it made me realize that Spain is actually a great
country.
parineum wrote 1 day ago:
I don't see how that makes the measure bullshit. Outlook and
expectations are related to happiness. If you want for nothing
but have little it's better than a never ending treadmill of
more.
Having a culture that produces happier people in worse
circumstances doesn't make those people less happy.
phony-account wrote 1 day ago:
> Having a culture that produces happier people in worse
circumstances doesn't make those people less happy
The question is whether stoicism in the face of what most
people would categorize as suffering should be classified as
“happiness”.
allturtles wrote 17 hours 2 min ago:
Yes, absolutely. How else would you define it? The whole
point of happiness is that is a subjective, internal state.
If you just want to know if people live in a cold, dark
climate you don't need to ask them.
SiempreViernes wrote 1 day ago:
To be fair, nothing in Sweden can match the flooding of
Valencia.
oldestofsports wrote 1 day ago:
We’ve had about 1 hour of sunlight so far in december where i
live in Finland, but it’s fine. It also makes the sun way
more enjoyable when it finally shines in the summer.
I’d never want to live in perpetual summer. Seasons brings
joy.
haritha-j wrote 1 day ago:
I'm from Sri Lanka, and i'm glad you're 'happy' with it, but
i'll take my eternal sunshine over months of darkness anyday.
phony-account wrote 1 day ago:
> I’d never want to live in perpetual summer. Seasons
brings joy
Even this is a typical myth that I often hear from
Scandinavians. In fact different parts of Spain (or England
or France) have also clearly demarcated seasons.
If you want to experience the joy of Autumn then the crisp,
long days of an English Fall are incomparably more distinct
than the unrelenting darkness that’s almost
indistinguishable from Winter in Scandinavia, for instance.
And when Spring comes to the valleys of the temperate regions
of Spain, then the blossom and explosion of wild flowers is
miraculous.
But like I said, from preschool onwards Scandinavians are
indoctrinated with the belief that they live in the best of
all possible worlds, and no amount of actual experience can
ever dent that notion.
oldestofsports wrote 12 hours 24 min ago:
If the temp stays above 0 degrees celsius all year round it
does not count as having seasons, since winter is obviously
missing.
arethuza wrote 1 day ago:
Not sure that "crisp" is a word I'd use to describe any
part of the UK in autumn - probably more like "soggy" - but
that applies to any season!
phony-account wrote 1 day ago:
> Not sure that "crisp" is a word I'd use to describe any
part of the UK in autumn - probably more like "soggy" -
but that applies to any season!
From the gently self-deprecating nature of your answer
I’m guessing you’re British - and this is indeed the
whole point of what I’m saying.
I genuinely and deeply miss this aspect of the English
character which is totally lacking in Sweden - the
websites called “shitLondon” or the insistence that
English food is inferior to Italian or French cuisine or
this repeated idea that it always rains (it doesn’t).
That self-mockery simply doesn’t exist here, apart from
when it’s some sort of humble-brag.
vjk800 wrote 1 day ago:
> The perception of Spain is much more positive in the Anglophone
world - it's viewed as a country where cost of living is low, you
can nap in the middle of the day, the women/men are hot and easy,
the wine is great and cheap, and you can party late at night.
If you're a tourist, you get to experience only those parts. If
you live there, you have to experience the other 99% of the life
also and it's not so great.
alephnerd wrote 1 day ago:
Did you even read the second sentence?
dang wrote 1 day ago:
As Garrison Keillor said about the Nordics: "We Lutherans are an
optimistic people—our glass is half empty and we're grateful for it."
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5152494
dang wrote 1 day ago:
Related. Others?
U.S. hits new low in World Happiness Report - [1] - Sept 2025 (277
comments)
U.S. No Longer Ranks Among 20 Happiest Countries - [2] - March 2024 (92
comments)
The Finnish Secret to Happiness? Knowing When You Have Enough - [3] -
April 2023 (19 comments)
World Happiness Report 2023 - [4] - March 2023 (2 comments)
World Happiness Report, 2019 - [5] - April 2019 (60 comments)
Why Denmark dominates the World Happiness Report rankings year after
year - [6] - March 2018 (3 comments)
Happiness report: Norway is the happiest place on earth - [7] - March
2017 (158 comments)
World Happiness Report 2015 [pdf] - [8] - Dec 2015 (22 comments)
Denmark 'happiest' country in the world - [9] - July 2008 (1 comment)
---
Bonus highlight: [10] (Feb 2013)
[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45378896
[2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39763595
[3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35411641
[4]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35230812
[5]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19615776
[6]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16720551
[7]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13913145
[8]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10793969
[9]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=234018
[10]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5152494
autoexec wrote 1 day ago:
Happiness is a purely subjective thing. It's plainly obvious that any
attempt at such comparisons will be doomed to be of limited utility.
There are plenty of other ways you could try to go about getting
something more useful, but none of them will be perfect.
The good news is that we don't need a perfect happiness report to think
about the things various countries are either doing very well or very
poorly and how our own lives might be changed if the place where we
live did things differently. The World Happiness Reports gets attention
year after year because it prompts that kind of thinking and there is
value in that.
hiAndrewQuinn wrote 1 day ago:
I have lived in Finland for the past four years, having emigrated from
the US like the other poster here, and the WHR is a common punching bag
topic amongst locals here.
The odd thing however is that when I ask them whether they think the
average Finn is happy, they say absolutely not, but when I ask them
whether they themselves are happy, most of the time I get a "oh this
place is actually pretty great for weirdos like me, I just mean like,
normal people would hate it here". But that's the thing: No one normal
chooses to live in Finland!
perons wrote 1 day ago:
I'm brazillian, moved to Finland 2 years ago to work here, and can
confirm the sentiment.
If you ask a Finn, most people are actually quite harsh to the
Finnish government, economy, etc - specially as of recent, since
Finland now has one of the worst unemployment rate in EU. But
lifestyle here is quite sober, everyone has hobbies and are quite
dedicated to them. I guess the Sauna and Avanto culture are the main
happiness drivers here, and tbh after experiencing it, I wouldn't
change for anything else.
looperhacks wrote 1 day ago:
A similar thing was recently reported for Germany as well. When asked
how they believe the average German is doing, most people answered
something along "worse than me".
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Unrelated, but this reminds me of Americans' opinions of their
congresscritters: Congresscritters as a whole are a terrible, corrupt
bunch, but your own congresscritter is amazing!
marcus_holmes wrote 1 day ago:
Friend of mine moved from Australia to Finland, and loved it there. I
can't imagine dealing with all that cold after Aussie's wonderful
heat, but he loved it.
Happiness is found in different places for different people,
thankfully.
fpoling wrote 1 day ago:
Even when it is extremely cold like -50 Celsius, one can still walk
outside for hours with sufficiently warm clothes. But try the same
when it is +50. And then spending weeks in air-conditioned
apartments was strictly worse for me than in a heated home during
the winter. Plus there is no insects when it is cold. So my
preference is for colder climate.
marcus_holmes wrote 12 hours 14 min ago:
I've lived in both, and my face hurts in the cold. There's
nothing quite like that amazing feeling of walking through warm
air, feels like the atmosphere is hugging me :) I prefer the warm
:)
abdullahkhalids wrote 15 hours 4 min ago:
The thing is, in cold places, it is possible for the temperature
to remain consistently cold for several days on end, day and
night. In hot places, even if day time temperatures approach 50
degrees, at night the temperature will almost certainly be below
35 degrees. So you can always go out at night and be fairly
comfortable temperature wise.
M95D wrote 3 hours 42 min ago:
How is that any better? Go out only at night vs. go out at any
time?
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
Yup, it's easier to dress for the cold than for the heat. Shorts
& sandals only take you so far.
burningChrome wrote 1 day ago:
Played hockey with several Finns. They always seemed grumpy about
something. The Norwegians and Swedes I played soccer with always had
a more cheerful disposition. They always made fun of the Northern
Finns, saying, "You'd be grumpy AF too if you had to deal with
Winter for 7 months every year!"
vidarh wrote 1 day ago:
I'm Norwegian, and the Norwegian stereotype of Finnish people used
to be that they are dour and introvert. And we're by and large
culturally a lot less outwardly cheerful to people we don't know
than the Danes.
Sometimes Norwegian TV would show Finnish dramas while I was
growing up in the '80s, and the standing joke was that the typical
Finnish drama had two guys hiking through the forest, one of them
saying something, and then half an hour more of hiking before the
other would reply. I don't remember whether that was accurate (it's
not as if I'd have kept watching), but I suspect not.
QuercusMax wrote 1 day ago:
I have a relative who decided to move up to Baffin Island and get
into long-distance arctic trekking. She'd probably fit right in.
Lerc wrote 1 day ago:
This is a fairly common discrepancy between how people perceive the
mean/median of a property is compared to the mean/median of how they
themselves are.
You see it in things like business confidence going in both
directions at various times, pessimism when things are going well,
optimism when things are going poorly.
It is very convenient in politics, because you can choose which
figure to report to make it seem like you are saying the same thing
but you can switch between them to make things look good (or bad l,
depending on your attention)
PLMUV9A4UP27D wrote 1 day ago:
As a Finn, I can confirm this.
bflesch wrote 1 day ago:
Finns are amazing!
tigranbs wrote 1 day ago:
As a US person, I have lived in Finland for 3 years, and I can assure
you that the Finns are the most content people you can imagine! They
can go months without talking to anyone and still consider themselves
"happy", but the correct word in English is "content".
That report is correct, it just they advertise with the wrong word in
the headline, I guess because it is more click-bate title than having
it as "The most content country"
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Are they though? Alcoholism and Seasonal Affective Disorder are rife
in Nordic countries.
ninalanyon wrote 15 hours 44 min ago:
Do you have a reference for that? The World Population Review [1]
says that alcoholism rates are similar to or less than the US,
Australia, Brazil. And definitely less than many other countries
around the world.
[1]: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/alcohol...
nephihaha wrote 3 hours 9 min ago:
These countries often have strict rules about alcohol which
reflect this. In some parts you had to buy alcohol from a
government store. Then there is usual tactic of taxing it to
death. As a result illegal alcohol production is common out in
the countryside.
Herring wrote 1 day ago:
It's extremely important if you're interested in social stability.
Unhappy people have a tendency to turn authoritarian and lash about,
hurting both their own society and anyone who looks different.
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Authoritarianism is usually imposed from above, not below.
edwinjm wrote 1 day ago:
In democracies, you sometimes can see authoritarians being
elected. Current situation in the USA is one example.
johnp314 wrote 19 hours 10 min ago:
You have much better (concrete) examples in South and Centeral
America, e.g. Venezuela & Nicaragua, but there are plenty of
others.
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Not really. The US situation is engineered so only two parties
ever get in, and are practically impossible to remove. Wait
several years and the other lot will get in.
Even with Trump we see a lot of policies and directions that
the Democrats have pursued previously.
QuercusMax wrote 1 day ago:
I dunno, "discontent" is a pretty politically charged word, going
back to Shakespeare - "Now is the winter of our discontent" from
Richard III is referring to an attempted political overthrow.
Unhappiness sounds much more pedestrian.
jfengel wrote 1 day ago:
It's referring to a successful political overthrow.
The quote really needs the first two lines:
Now is the winter of our discontent
made glorious summer by the sun of York.
The verb in the sentence is "is made", not just "is". "Now" it is
summer, not winter. They were discontent in the past. Now they
are happy.
York (Richard's brother, Edward, now King Edward IV) has
overthrown King Henry VI. There's also an important pun: "York"
also refers to their father, also named Richard, who was the Duke
of York until his death at the hands of Henry's faction. So
Edward is also the "son of York".
That said, Richard is being sarcastic. He's plotting the next
political overthrow, which will also be successful. And who will
in turn be overthrown again. That, at least, will put an end to
it, if for no other reason than that literally everybody else is
dead.
QuercusMax wrote 1 day ago:
Leave it to Shakespeare to use a garden-path sentence to open
one of his greatest plays....
ninalanyon wrote 15 hours 50 min ago:
It's only fifteen words! And very straightforward.
jfengel wrote 18 hours 5 min ago:
One of my most important jobs as a Shakespeare actor is to
find ways to enunciate some of his over-long sentences in a
way that allows the audience to follow them just by
listening.
In this case, it's not too hard. Shakespeare likes giving you
oppositions, like "winter" and "summer". Put the stress
there, and the audience will follow. And you don't need to
breathe at the end of the line; it can flow directly into the
next one.
Ekaros wrote 1 day ago:
As Finn I would agree. Finland is fine. Not the greatest and not
happiest. But overall it is fine still. In most areas cost of living
is pretty reasonable, services are sufficient. Police for example
does good enough job. Probably could earn more money somewhere else,
but why bother...
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
You don't see many cops in Finland. You just don't.
Firstly because the social benefits system keeps a lot of people
out of trouble ' call it bribery if you like, but it meets basic
needs. Secondly because there's a lot of private "security" types
around - for example in the supermarkets, keeping out drunks and
dealing with shoplifters - letting the police focus on the real
stuff.
BurningFrog wrote 1 day ago:
As a Swede, I've always been confused by these results. The self image
of Swedes is that we're fairly miserable on average, and don't know how
to enjoy life as much as some people in warmer climates.
That said, note that both things mentioned in here will raise average
happiness:
> But it turns out that the residents of the same Scandinavian
countries that the press dutifully celebrates for their supposed
happiness are especially likely to take antidepressants or even to
commit suicide.
marginalia_nu wrote 1 day ago:
I think (as a fellow Swede) that there is a culturally sense of guilt
involved in having a comparatively comfortable life and not being
happy about it, compounded by a sense of guilt that a comfortable
life is somehow undeserved.
Saying you are unhappy is in a sense saying you need a better quality
of life, or deserve more happiness, both of which are kind of taboo
under the Law of Jante.
rodrigodlu wrote 1 day ago:
As an introvert living in Rio de Janeiro, I can tell you that a lot
of being happier in a hot climate with a lot of people around is just
a social mask.
When I start deep questions about financial safety, the future and so
on, just by asking I can be labelled as a pessimist. And I'm far from
that.
I'm a fairly resolved and confident introvert, but I know many timid
people that feel ashamed that they don't feel "happy" in these large
group of people, that are extremely agitated and yelling around to
grab some piece of attention they need.
And what is being shown in social media, documentaries and etc is
just one pov.
PLMUV9A4UP27D wrote 1 day ago:
It's a good point about living in a hot climate often being
associated with living a happy life. Although to what I've seen,
there isn't much evidence for such a correlation.
BurningFrog wrote 1 day ago:
Simple theory:
In a warm climate you see people walking around feeling
comfortable.
In a cold climate, the people you see are freezing.
bluGill wrote 1 day ago:
People are not freezing in a cold climate - they have plenty of
coats on. In hot climates you run out of clothes to take off -
even nudists.
BurningFrog wrote 19 hours 28 min ago:
I grew up in northern Sweden. You're definitely miserable
even when dressed perfectly in -15°C!
You're right that once it gets over +30°C or so, you'll be
miserable whatever you wear. But there is a large temperature
range below that that is wonderful. The Bay Area is almost
always in that zone.
ninalanyon wrote 15 hours 31 min ago:
It's currently above freezing, dark, and wet here in Norway
about 40 km south of Oslo. I'd be a lot more comfortable
if it were -15 C. The sun would probably shine for more of
the day instead of being hidden behind dark clouds and it
would be dry; going for a walk would be much more
enjoyable.
beautiful_zhixu wrote 1 day ago:
Well I feel cold in winter sometimes even with a coat on. It
hurts when I go outside, so I stay inside more, but if I stay
inside too much, it hurts.
The point about hot environments is true, but people are not
anxious and your body rarely hurts. They are lazy and their
minds blank out. It is often too hot to do anything except
try to scam anxious northerners and move away from mosquitos.
hamdingers wrote 1 day ago:
> “Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from zero at the
bottom to ten at the top. Suppose we say that the top of the ladder
represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder
represents the worst possible life for you. If the top step is 10 and
the bottom step is 0, on which step of the ladder do you feel you
personally stand at the present time?”
My immediate problem with this is the lower bound of responses in a
given country would be determined by your perception of the safety nets
available to you. Someone in a Scandinavian country where there are
virtually no unsheltered homeless people probably doesn't index their
zero to "dying of exposure on the sidewalk due to untreated mental
illness," while an American who sees that regularly would.
opo wrote 1 day ago:
>...Someone in a Scandinavian country where there are virtually no
unsheltered homeless people probably doesn't index their zero to
"dying of exposure on the sidewalk due to untreated mental illness,"
while an American who sees that regularly would.
Maybe I am not understanding this - do you think the average American
regularly sees people dying of exposure on the sidewalk? Or what do
you mean?
nxobject wrote 19 hours 42 min ago:
In regions with like climates, amount of snowfall, etc. perhaps.
euroderf wrote 1 day ago:
When I was going to grad school in DC, I'd suggest to classmates
that we place bets on the date of the first person dying of
exposure in the city every winter.
This bet kinda horrified some people, but I think I got my point
across.
decimalenough wrote 1 day ago:
That seems to be working as intended? The unhappiness of both "dying
of exposure on the sidewalk due to untreated mental illness" and the
constant gnawing fear that this is a realistic outcome due to medical
bankruptcy or whatever should pull down a country's happiness index.
I've always figured that this is in fact a big reason why the Nordic
countries do so well on the survey: the average is lifted not by
shiny happy people holding hands, but by the strong safety net
ensuring that you can't fall into a pit of despair.
greygoo222 wrote 1 day ago:
You're misreading the comment. hamdingers is suggesting that the
fear of "dying of exposure on the sidewalk" is inflating a
country's happiness index, because people are using "dying of
exposure on the sidewalk" as a realistic worst-case baseline.
SiempreViernes wrote 1 day ago:
No, the two people before you both understood that point, the
disagreement is only on wether it is unfair that a country with a
lot of people fearing dying of cold on the sidewalk is considered
"less happy".
SR2Z wrote 1 day ago:
So why then is Bhutan so happy?
nephihaha wrote 1 day ago:
Because everyone's told to smile?
Seriously, though, I think it is because it has a good natural
environment and strong extended families. But that is about to
change with their new planned city.
SpicyLemonZest wrote 1 day ago:
Bhutan is not ranked in the World Happiness Report, and at least
one source ( [1] ) says that international comparative data
contradicts the Bhutanese government's claim that their people
are particularly happy.
[1]: https://www.vox.com/policy/471950/gross-domestic-product...
celeryd wrote 1 day ago:
Someone in a Scandinavian country is probably well informed of how
terrible it is for the poorest and most vulnerable outside their
country. The indexes are probably the same.
The person in the Scandinavian country, when asked this question,
will think "hmm, well I am not in America, so I will add 3 steps to
my answer" and, och se där, up they go to the top of the World
Ranking.
SiempreViernes wrote 1 day ago:
Some might do that, but hopefully most people read the question
properly and see it specifically asks about the situation for you,
so thinking about the starving children in Gaza is not part of the
question.
t0mk wrote 1 day ago:
I don't think that people in Scandinavia are well informed about
how life can be for the poorest outside of their country.
> bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life >>>for
you<<<.
..and when asked this, I believe they consider how bad it can get
for them in their country.
Based on my experience living and talking with people in
Scandinavia and eastern europe.
mvdtnz wrote 1 day ago:
"Scandinavians don't know that poverty exists" is a pretty wild
claim.
haritha-j wrote 1 day ago:
True, although i do think its likely that its not top of mind.
When things aren't relatable, its hard to take them into
account in everyday life, even when you're factually aware of
it.
4ndrewl wrote 1 day ago:
I guess kudos for doing a deep dive into this, but was it necessary?
Aren't all of these types of things (unhappiest day of the year, best
day to be born on, age that we're happiest etc) clearly
pseudo-scientific/scientistic babble - and brands can then just use
them to sell the Scandi (or whatever) lifestyle. Nobody who believes
this is going to be swayed by your anaylsis. :)
staticman2 wrote 1 day ago:
The survey being used was created by a Princeton University
psychology professor. It may or may not be useful but there's nothing
obviously pseudo-scientific about it. I do not think the linked
article writer is making that claim.
Analemma_ wrote 1 day ago:
Yes, it's necessary, and getting more so all the time: lately I've
been seeing more and more commentary trying to tie happiness
measurements to some political stance: "conservatives are happier
than liberals", "women are happier after divorce", etc. And
increasingly it's not coming just from random commenters, but from
people with real power.
In such an environment it's vital to know if the methodology for
measuring happiness is good or bunk.
griffzhowl wrote 1 day ago:
How much of the article did you read? The main substance of it is not
that the UN rankings are flawed, but how the rankings change based on
the broader analysis by Blanchflower and Bryson. That result can't so
easily be read off from our cynical preconceptions
itsdrewmiller wrote 1 day ago:
Should outlets like the NYT be reporting uncritically on
pseudoscience? As long as they are I think this kind of work is
extremely valuable.
briandw wrote 1 day ago:
No kidding. I lived in Finland for a few years and no way are they some
of the happiest people.
IAmBroom wrote 1 day ago:
Whom are you replying to? The only other comment I see about Finland
agrees with the take that they are happiest.
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