March 20, 2024 – 9:14 pm
We have good news, more precisely World Happiness Report 2024 The editors have good news: Eastern and Central Europe is catching up with the West in happiness. According to a comprehensive report that evaluates happiness according to many factors, the residents of our region are significantly happier today than they were a decade ago. Among the regions, Eastern and Central Europe made the greatest progress in happiness. Moreover, the Czech Republic and Lithuania also managed to enter the list of the 20 happiest countries in the ranking, at 18th and 19th places, while Slovenia just dropped out of the top 20 and ranked 21st (I hope they are not bitter about this). ). Hungary ranks 56th on the list, ahead of our neighbor Croatia.
Of course, the Nordic countries cannot be excluded from the top of the ranking, which explains and records happiness in terms of per capita GDP, social safety net, life expectancy, freedoms, generosity and notable corruption: according to this year's report, the Finns are the most HE, followed by Danes, Icelanders and Swedes.
In this year's report, for the first time, the happiness of younger and older generations was measured. For example, it turned out that younger generations in the US were much more unhappier than baby boomers, which contributed to the US falling out of the top 20. In Central and Eastern Europe, the situation is exactly the opposite: although the level of happiness of both older and younger people has increased compared to the period between 2006 and 2010 (the survey results are based on a multi-year average), it is the younger generations that are the happiest. . Much happier than older people. Moreover, the young man from Central and Eastern Europe feels the same way as his Western European contemporaries. If we were to include only the happiness of people under 30 years old, Lithuania would be in first place, and Hungary would improve by 20 places and occupy 36th place.
On the other hand, older people seem to live in other countries. This difference is most striking in the case of Croatia, where, based on the numbers of young people, it would be 66 places higher on the list than when assessing the happiness of the elderly.
