The International Day of Happiness: What Is Gross National Happiness?

In our era of aggressive consumerism, happiness can be purchased in all shapes and colors at every corner. Marketing campaigns claim that pure happiness consists in buying their products, politicians desperately promise us happiness once in four years, Hollywood tells us that 90-60-90 is the only true way to being happy, and love is sold online at accessible prices.

The pursuit of happiness is a fundamental human goal, argued the General Assembly of the United Nations in its resolution of 12 July 2012, proclaiming 20 March the International Day of Happiness and boosting at the same time the World Wide Web with researches and opinionated articles about happiness.

At the first glance, happiness depends on an overwhelming amount of factors. Family, friends and pets are the classy old-school version of what makes one happy, even though internet has proven that cute pictures with cats still make your day. Now, on one hand researchers focus on how social media influences one’s well-being, and on the other hand they study how health and happiness impact the gross domestic product and therefore increase a country’s economy.

University of Michigan published in August 2013 a study on how Facebook, while providing a huge network for the basic human need for social connection, declines the subjective well-being in young adults. Meanwhile, direct interaction with other people did not show any of these negative outcomes.

The sudden turn towards studying the phenomenon of happiness might be questionable, as happiness is becoming more and more a widely-spread and famous way to measure the success of a certain government, organization or private business.  Two years ago, the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network , run by an economist from Columbia University in cooperation with UN Millennium Development, started reporting on the ‘World Happiness Report,’ a research that studies the development of happiness in 150 countries.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoOj0K74WwI

“Wealth is about so much more than pounds, or euros or dollars can ever measure; It’s time we admitted that there’s more to life than money, and it’s time we focused not just on GDP, but on GWB – general well-being,” said British Prime Minister David Cameron at Google Zeitgeist Europe 2006 conference.

“Improving our society’s sense of well-being is, I believe, the central political challenge of our times.”

In a World Health Organization interview Andrew Oswald, professor of economics and behavioral science at the University of Warwick, and one of the first economists in the UK to study emotional prosperity, said that “GDP is crumbling as a target – it is already out of date.”

Taking a look at the most prosperous and therefore “happy” countries might enforce the idea that the well-being of citizens has a strong correlation with the country’s economy.
The Legatum Prosperity Index, a ranking made annually and based on a various number of elements such as wealth, quality of life and economic growth,  that is powered by the Legatum Institute, showed that the following counties are the most prosperous ones:
1. Norway;
2. Switzerland;
3. Canada;
4. Sweden;
5. New Zealand;
6. Denmark;
7. Australia;
8. Finland;
9. Netherlands;
10. Luxembourg.

Nevertheless, the First World Happiness Report Launched at the United Nations revealed that these are the countries with the highest levels of happiness:

1.Denmark;
2. Norway;
3. Switzerland;
4. Netherlands;
5. Sweden.

The same report proved that a happier country is a richer one, with strong social support, well-educated people, low rate of unemployment, and high living standards. For instance, during the past 30 years our planet became a happier one, by 0.14 times the standard deviation of happiness around the world.

Happy International Day of Happiness!