The world has come out of the Covid-19 pandemic more generous, with human happiness levels virtually intact. This is one of the conclusions of the “World Happiness Report.” Prepared every year by the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN), the 2021 and 2022 editions devoted much analysis to the impact of the health crisis on the happiness of citizens.
The work, in which STI experts Lord Richard Layard and Lara Aknin participated, has determined that in recent years the place occupied by each of the 150 countries included in the Happiness Index has remained unaltered compared to the years before the crisis. It further reveals that people practiced more acts of kindness (such as volunteering or helping strangers) in 2021, becoming 25% more generous than before the pandemic.
However, the report also acknowledges that the two million deaths from Covid-19 in 2020 and the increase in deaths in the world (+4%) has represented “a serious social welfare loss.” “For the living there has been greater economic insecurity, anxiety, disruption of every aspect of life, and, for many people, stress and challenges to mental and physical health,” declares the study, which used statistical data from the Gallup company.
“Covid-19 is the biggest health crisis we’ve seen in more than a century,” points out Professor John Helliwell of the University of British Columbia, who has also been involved as editor of the report. Despite this, Helliwell adds, in 2021 there was “a remarkable worldwide growth in all three acts of kindness monitored in the Gallup World Poll. Helping strangers, volunteering, and donations in 2021 were strongly up in every part of the world.”
“This surge of benevolence, which was especially great for the helping of strangers, provides powerful evidence that people respond to help others in need, creating in the process more happiness for the beneficiaries, good examples for others to follow, and better lives for themselves,” says Helliwell, who is convinced of the importance of benevolence and trust in any context, but especially during the coronavirus pandemic.
Results and Objectives
In the 2021 edition, the ninth since the report’s inception, the global happiness rating was 5.5 on average, denoting a midpoint between happiness and unhappiness, according to experts. As in the previous eight reports, Finland turned out to be the happiest country, with a rating above 7,800 points, while the least happy was Afghanistan, with just 2,500. With a rating of 6.4, Europe was the happiest continent (nine of the ten happiest countries are located on this continent), followed by North America, Central America and the Caribbean with 6.1.
The report scores citizens’ happiness on seven factors: GDP per capita; life expectancy at birth; social support; freedom to make decisions in life; generosity; perceptions of government and/or business corruption; and positive or negative affects (recent experience of emotions). Among the objectives of the work, according to its promoters, is to urge governments to “give more importance to happiness and well-being in determining how to achieve and measure social and economic development.”
