Led by its youth, U.S. sinks in World Happiness Report

[marylander1940]

OP note: it would be nice to see the same ranking by state and city. I have a feeling many young folks don't appreciate how lucky they are to have been born here and feel uncertainty about housing and cost of education, besides the image of success they see in Instagram when it comes to looks and money is hard to achieve.

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The World Happiness Report is a partnership of Gallup, the Oxford Wellbeing Research Centre, the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, and the...

Finland is the happiest country in the world for the seventh year in a row

WWW.CNBC.COM

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The World Happiness Report released its annual ranking of the happiest countries in the world.

 

2024 World Happiness Report: Happiest countries revealed, US fails to crack top 20

WWW.USATODAY.COM

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The 2024 World Happiness Report has been released on International Day of Happiness. The US is not in the top 20.

 

Edited March 23 by marylander1940

[marylander1940]

 

[mike carey]

The thread title leads with a loaded assumption, as if something the US and specifically its young people have done is somehow the 'cause' of what is perceived as a decline. Young people being less happy than their elders is an almost universal global phenomenon. To pick one issue, home ownership in Anglo countries at least is more difficult than it was, and as new entrants to the market this affects young people more, to the point in Australia that many of them feel completely excluded. So of course they are less happy than their elders, who are already home owners, and perhaps less happy than they themselves were last year. Young people in the US aren't on their own. Second, this survey is about the relative standing of countries. There is nothing that I could see that said the aggregate absolute level of happiness in the US has declined, only that it has fallen in the list of countries. Even if the overall level of happiness in the US had increased, the US would still have gone down the list if the happiness levels in other countries had increased by more.

So, probably nothing to see here, but don't let that get in the way of a clickbait thread title. In some ways things never change. Old people who've created the problems and insecurities that many young people face (and, granted, many of the positive aspects of our societies) rail, as ever, over the ingratitude of the young. How very dare they feel unhappy with the world their elders have wrought.

[marylander1940]

2 hours ago, mike carey said:

The thread title leads with a loaded assumption, as if something the US and specifically its young people have done is somehow the 'cause' of what is perceived as a decline. Young people being less happy than their elders is an almost universal global phenomenon. To pick one issue, home ownership in Anglo countries at least is more difficult than it was, and as new entrants to the market this affects young people more, to the point in Australia that many of them feel completely excluded. So of course they are less happy than their elders, who are already home owners, and perhaps less happy than they themselves were last year. Young people in the US aren't on their own. Second, this survey is about the relative standing of countries. There is nothing that I could see that said the aggregate absolute level of happiness in the US has declined, only that it has fallen in the list of countries. Even if the overall level of happiness in the US had increased, the US would still have gone down the list if the happiness levels in other countries had increased by more.

So, probably nothing to see here, but don't let that get in the way of a clickbait thread title. In some ways things never change. Old people who've created the problems and insecurities that many young people face (and, granted, many of the positive aspects of our societies) rail, as ever, over the ingratitude of the young. How very dare they feel unhappy with the world their elders have wrought.

The name of the thread is the name of an article about this same issue.

Clickbait thread title? Guilty as charged! Next? 

"Old people who created the problem that many young people face...." Please, every generation is different.

I hope you're not equating homeownership with happiness, that's simplistic to say the least! 

 

[Luv2play]

I think home ownership these days is a contributing factor to happiness in many countries where prices of houses and rents have both skyrocketed in recent years. Whereas in times past it was only in certain large cities where high prices prevailed today it is virtually everywhere. 
Thinking back to my youth, I was able to rent very nice apartments before getting into homeownership. Then I was able to buy my first house at 30, 5 years after starting to work. The fact that having a nice place to live gave me a certain sense of security and contentment. I suppose I took it for granted because everyone I knew had the same experience. 
Today’s young ones are having a terrible time to find even apartments at reasonable rents never mind buying a house while in their 30’s. And many are loaded down with college debts. There are exceptions of course but the majority I think are struggling. 

[marylander1940]

4 minutes ago, Luv2play said:

I think home ownership these days is a contributing factor to happiness in many countries where prices of houses and rents have both skyrocketed in recent years. Whereas in times past it was only in certain large cities where high prices prevailed today it is virtually everywhere. 
Thinking back to my youth, I was able to rent very nice apartments before getting into homeownership. Then I was able to buy my first house at 30, 5 years after starting to work. The fact that having a nice place to live gave me a certain sense of security and contentment. I suppose I took it for granted because everyone I knew had the same experience. 
Today’s young ones are having a terrible time to find even apartments at reasonable rents never mind buying a house while in their 30’s. And many are loaded down with college debts. There are exceptions of course but the majority I think are struggling. 

Not only that but they see an ideal of looks, wealth, success, etc. on Instagram all day long that's impossible to achieve for most. Imagine back then on a daily basis seeing others rubbing their success in your face making you see the glass half empty.

 

[Luv2play]

3 minutes ago, marylander1940 said:

Not only that but they see an ideal of looks, wealth, success, etc. on Instagram all day long that's impossible to achieve for most. Imagine back then on a daily basis seeing others rubbing their success in your face making you see the glass half empty.

 

Yes I think the rise of social media has something to do with it as well. 

[marylander1940]

26 minutes ago, Luv2play said:

Yes I think the rise of social media has something to do with it as well. 

yes, the gap between perception and reality is wider than ever before. 

[viewing ownly]

Theories with a couple of these wacky results. Perhaps the people of Libya are so happy because Gaddafi has been dead for over a decade. Perhaps the people of Dominican Republic are so sad because there's a lopsided shortage of men compared to women due to all of them being professional baseball infielders elsewhere all over the globe. (Moderators : please don't relocate to the sports section). 🤣

[mike carey]

3 minutes ago, viewing ownly said:

Theories with a couple of these wacky results. Perhaps the people of Libya are so happy because Gaddafi has been dead for over a decade. Perhaps the people of Dominican Republic are so sad because there's a lopsided shortage of men compared to women due to all of them being professional baseball infielders elsewhere all over the globe. (Moderators : please don't relocate to the sports section). 🤣

Thanks for the suggestion! I'll get onto it.

Seriously, when the topic was started there was a, probably small, chance that it would discus a link between happiness and the general level of well-being in society, which is a health issue of sorts, so a fit for the Men's Health Forum. It has not. It has remained a general discussion of the factors that might affect how happy people in various counties were with their circumstances. That discussion fits better in the Lounge.

[BSR]

3 hours ago, Luv2play said:

Yes I think the rise of social media has something to do with it as well. 

If you look at the multiple of median income :: median home price, housing in most regions of the country is shockingly expensive.  College tuition has soared, increasing far faster than overall inflation.  Forget social media, a grasp of simple arithmetic will make young Americans realize that housing & debt are crushing them.

But I agree, social media can make them even more miserable, like salt in the wound.