Regardless of the devastating year we have had, the research group Gallup World Poll has managed to rank the happiest country in the world, and the result does not deviate from what we were expecting. Finland has snagged the number one spot for the fourth year in a row. The second place went to Iceland, followed by Denmark in third place, Switzerland in fourth, and the Netherlands in fifth place.
This Country Has Officially Been Named the Happiest in the World
Other notable rankings from the World Happiness Report include the United States rising from 18th to 14th place, the United Kingdom dropping from 13th to 18th place, and Australia remaining 12th overall.
“We need urgently to learn from COVID-19,” Jeffrey Sachs, the co-editor of the Happiness Report and a professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University told CNN, adding, “The pandemic reminds us of our global environmental threats, the urgent need to cooperate, and the difficulties of achieving cooperation in each country and globally.”
The World Happiness Report was assembled a bit differently this year. Researchers were not able to conduct in-person interviews in a number of countries. COVID-19 and its correlation to wellbeing also took a central spot while preparing the research questions and synthesizing the data. The report is primarily based on GDP, freedom, life expectancy, and levels of corruption.
The top 10 has remained largely unchanged from the previous year with Iceland jumping from number four to number two and Norway slipping from fifth to eighth place. Germany made a remarkable jump from 17th to seventh place, and Croatia rose from ranking 79th to 23rd. You can read the full report and its findings here.