Other Crap

The World's Happiest Countries

It's mostly filled with predictable results, but some things did surprise me.

• Bulgarians are the unhappiest Europeans by a wide, wide margin. Bulgaria beat only one Asian country (Cambodia) and one in the Western Hemisphere (Haiti). It beat many African countries, but also finished behind many troubled ones like Tanzania and Sudan. I had no idea Bulgaria was in such rough shape.

  
  

• Although Hungary has appeared on some recent lists of good places to live, Hungarians are dissatisfied with their lives. 34% of them are "struggling," about the same as Haiti.

  
  

• Costa Rica is the happiest in the Americas. Only five countries, all in Europe, have a populace which feels more satisfied than the Costa Ricans.

  
  

• Among true Asian countries (excluding Australia, New Zealand, and Israel), the most satisfied populace is in Turkmenistan. That's a surprise. I believe this is because their lives, although sucking royally, now seem so much better than they did under Niyazov, the crazy former dictator.

  
  

• Eastern Asians are miserable. Excluding Taiwan, Thailand is the highest-ranked, at 79th in the world. Even Taiwan is not much better at 70th.

  
  

• The happiest people in Eastern Europe are in Belarus, 54th in the world. (Unless you consider the Czech Republic (37th) to be in Eastern Europe.)

  
  

• Brazil has a lot of poverty, but its people are the happiest in South America, and are more satisfied than Americans.