The world's happiest countries for 2023

[brooklynite]

CNN

For the sixth year in a row, Finland is the world’s happiest country, according to World Happiness Report rankings based largely on life evaluations from the Gallup World Poll.

The Nordic country and its neighbors Denmark, Iceland, Sweden and Norway all score very well on the measures the report uses to explain its findings: healthy life expectancy, GDP per capita, social support, low corruption, generosity in a community where people look after each other and freedom to make key life decisions.

But since we can’t all move to Finland, is there something other societies can learn from these rankings?

“Is it, are they doing things that we wish we’d seen before and we can start doing? Or is it something unique about their climate and history that make them different? And fortunately, at least from my perspective, the answer is the former,” said Helliwell, who is a professor emeritus at the Vancouver School of Economics, University of British Columbia.

[hlthe2b]

1. US ranks 30th out of the world's Democracies/or 'almost' Democracies and 15th in happiness

I suspect the latter is falsely elevated but... sigh...

[jimfields33]

3. I still say we are higher ranked then this shows.

We have immigrants all over the world risking life to come here. That’s the only proof I need. Do you really hear much immigration going on in Finland? There you go.

[hlthe2b]

4. Easy to answer. Denmark, Finland, Sweden and countries throughout the region have the most

restrictive immigration policies. That does not equate to people not WANTING to immigrate to those
countries. And the democracy ratings have little to do with "perception" and those wanting to come here, the latter one might presume to be heavily influenced by historical understanding of the US, its political climate and opportunities (which granted look like nirvana compared to many of the violence-ridden countries from which they come).
Scroll down to methodology:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index

Happiness ratings would seem to have more to do with internal perceptions as well but I have not taken the time to review their methods.

[jimfields33]

5. That's true. It's weird those Nordic counties aren't called out on their immigration policies

They seem xenophobic to me. Why do they get a pass?

[hlthe2b]

6. They are and I don't know either.

[betsuni]

7. I visited a cousin in central Norway, cousin's wife was a teacher.

Two immigrant children enrolled in school, only a few families in this rural area. Was shocked when she launched into a racist rant about them. A country can have highly educated people, the best social safety nets and nationalized health care -- class and economic equality doesn't erase racism. That's a myth.

[Marius25]

9. They're smaller than almost all US states in population.

Norway only has 4 million people. Denmark and Finland are less than 6 million. They can't support tons of immigrants. My US state, which is fairly small itself, has more people than every Nordic country.

[Marius25]

8. We have immigrants from worse countries trying to come here

because it's perceived as easier and a place where you can get rich, because profit is all that matters. Nordic countries are no where near poor countries that have a big group of fleeing immigrants. You won't see many Norwegians or Danish trying to move to the US.

I know multiple people who would gladly leave the US to move to a Nordic country, but we all know they're very strict on immigration and they're small countries.

I would ditch the US and move to Norway or Denmark tomorrow if I could, because they're astronomically better than the US will ever be.

[betsuni]

2. Americans have been trained to hate taxes, one of the big problems.