Does money truly buy happiness?
This is the question posed by Gallup’s Global Managing Partner, Jon Clifton, upon the release of Gallup’s 2019 Global Emotions Report this week.
A similar poll—the World Happiness Report—is made annually by the United Nations, and it is one where the most advanced economies normally figure at the top. Better living conditions and a feeling of “thriving” are associated with advanced economies where people do not have to worry about meeting their basic needs.
But Clifton says that there are two ways to define happiness: How people live their lives, and how they see it.
Given this distinction, it does not automatically follow that those with a higher quality of life are necessarily the happiest. Other studies, Clifton adds, point to a cap or satiation point on how much income a person needs to feel “happy.” Different researches suggest different amounts; what is agreed is that beyond the cap, the feeling diminishes.
The Gallup poll, meanwhile, seems to say that while “Latin Americans may not always rate their lives the best (like the Nordic countries), they laugh, smile and experience enjoyment like no one else in the world.”
Paraguay was the world's happiest and most positive country, followed by Panama, Guatemala, Mexico, El Salvador and Honduras—even as these nations suffered from high levels of poverty and violence.
Meanwhile, Chad was the most negative nation, followed by Niger, Sierra Leone, Iraq and Iran.
In the survey, respondents were asked positive-experience questions: Did they feel well-rested, were they treated with respect, did they smile or laugh a lot, learn or do something interesting on the day before the interview?
Globally, people said they experienced a lot of enjoyment (71 percent), felt well-rested (72 percent), smiled or laughed a lot (74 percent) and felt treated with respect (87 percent).
The negative-experience questions were whether respondents experienced physical pain, worry, sadness, stress, anger for most of the day before the interview.
Here, people reported greater anger, worry and sadness, all record highs. Stress dropped two percentage points while physical pain was unchanged.
More than 140 countries participated in the survey.
These complex numbers tell us that there is really no single way to measure happiness, or even define what it is. People are culturally different and may interpret the same set of events, even the same set of questions, a different way. Still what makes us all universally human is to work toward the goal that all people would be happy because of what are happening in their lives—not in spite of them.