Happiness report: Norway is the happiest place on earth
bbc.com
bbc.com
I know it says "subjective happiness" in the report, but I still suspect it might be an influence.
In many other cultures, success is celebrated. Janteloven is the opposite of that, ensuring that success is criticized an seen as undeserved or lucky.
I find it to be one of the worst aspects of Scandinavian culture, which is full of other good things, that I love.
http://denstoredanske.dk/Kunst_og_kultur/Litteratur/Nyere_mo...
Also, the Law of Jante made him kill a sailor at a deserted bay in Newfoundland. So we should be careful when understanding the book as some universal sociological study.
In the book he states the law is a way for the lower classes to keep each other down, and he explicit states the law of Jante exists among the proletariat everywhere and is stronger in Brooklyn than in Jante (the fictional Scandinavian town in the book). He was a socialist, of course.
I do think a "soft form" of the law can be used to understand Scandinavian culture to some extent.
A colleague of mine has a childhood friend who owns a grocery store. Sensing that business was good, he opened a second grocery store in a neighboring town. It went great until the rest of the town knew he owned two stores -- then they started boycotting the second store, which was quickly forced to close its doors.
Janteloven, the climate and the institutionalized introversion are the worst aspects of Scandinavian life. Other than that, things are all in all very good.
I suspect something else was going on with your friends second store, since successful stores growing into chains is a pretty common. Did people officially boycott the store or is it just his interpretation of events?
Obviously there is some geographic and socio-cultural variation; you wouldn't see the same degree of skepticism among most people in the biggest cities, but I am pretty confident I haven't misunderstood what Janteloven says. It's not a positive thing, and not conductive to an environment of high performance.
Granted, things might be better now than when I went to public school 15 years ago, but back then this attitude was practically institutionalized. I eventually went to private school after 3 years of being forced to sit through science classes of stuff I already knew, that were regardless torpedoed by uncontrollable classroom clowns. In private school, we had "choose your level" classes, and things improved. Many friends in university had similar experiences.
It was quite a surprise to hear of high schools in the US that actually cultivated students who wanted to learn more than the minimum.
But I guess one could argue such an attitude might actually make you happier, in addition to merely appearing happier on reports? Who knows...
Fantastic events are wonderful to see in small doses, but when it's a constant stream of oneupsmanship of who is doing better than others, it's easy to get caught up and think, "Gee, everyone is leading such incredible lives, why aren't I doing the same?" And to temporarily fill that need by posting something yourself, which only perpetuates the cycle.
I found QoL improvements when I chose to abstain from Facebook in December, specifically an increase in mindfulness and satisfaction with my daily life. Of course, that doesn't mean I don't encourage self-improvement, but I think the stress/angst that can arise from social networks can be counterproductive to ones own journey.
It's reasons like these, and the complete waste of time and escapism that has become Facebook in my life that I made a resolution to unfollow everyone except the closest family and friends and delete the mobile app. So far I don't feel like I'm missing anything, and ultimately I think my life has become richer/better for it. If you aren't being paid for it, or finding great joy from it there are much more fulfilling things to kill your time with... reading, the outdoors, time with friends (unglued from the digital world).
2) Having lived abroad extensively and traveled around many places keenly trying to observe these things I'd say Norwegian happiness is real. But we have a tendency in Norway to take every good thing for granted and complain a lot. E.g. I noticed when in North American, despite equal wealth, there is a lot more hardship and stress. You can even tell just by looking at people. People are stressed out about over demanding jobs, risk of losing health care, crime, dysfunctional politics etc.
We Norwegians have among the best work-life balances of anywhere. Works doesn't stress people out as much as many other places. And the government provided welfare services means we worry a lot less about stuff than people in the rest of the world.
3) Another thing I notice is that people trust each other to a high level in Norway. In many other parts of the world suspicion and trust grinds on people. It can imagine it is exaushting dealing with a constant paranoia where other people, the government, the police etc can never be trusted.
This just means that how happy a person feels correlates well with how happy others perceive them to be. This says nothing about whether their subjective feelings reflect objective reality.
Research actually seems to suggest that happiness is very subjective, and may in fact have a strong genetic component[0]. I.e. whether a particular person is happy is dictated less by their circumstances and more by their outlook/personality/genetics. Of course, one's circumstances also play a role (e.g. a person will be less happy immediately after the death of a loved one), but subjective factors seem to win out overall.
[0] e.g. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201302/...
I agree that happiness is subjective and personality trait expression may very well have a genetic component, but I wouldn't dismiss societal and environmental factors entirely.
For example, inequality and air pollution are also associated with unhappiness.
https://news.virginia.edu/content/income-inequality-increase... https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130118125955.h...
When you have an "us" and "them" society, people are a lot more concerned that "they" are getting over and not working as hard.
There is a similar study that finds Latin American countries to be among the happiest. Discussed here:
http://www.livescience.com/50209-happiest-countries-latin-am...
It's not pessimism vs. optimism, it's that numeric ratings have no intrinsic, universal mapping to feelings, and cultures tend to map them differently.
There is little of the social conflict, poverty, health problems etc which plague many other countries.
That is what these things measure. Latin American countries would typically get pulled down because there is a signifiant portion of people who don't have very nice lives. This is what I've heard from foreigners living in northern Europe. They notice that there are very few people you observe who look genuinely dissatisfied with their life.
Please don't. That was the creation of one author that was a bit of a grump to put it mildly.
Also, he formulated that in the 1930s.
I think the problem arises from most resumes being BS, so if your resume doesn't claim you have 20 years experience in a 5-year-old technology, etc., recruiters probably think you're a complete loser. Well, that and the fact that most recruiters don't seem to have the reading comprehension of a dead badger...
Which has an implicit assumption that happiness = living your "best possible life".
There are definitely people in Africa, Latin America, etc, who recognize they may have better prospects elsewhere, but if they're content with where they are… isn't that happiness too?
Such rigor!
Will be interesting to see how spots 7, 8, 9 hold up going forward as many/most middle class people in these 3 countries increasingly find they cannot afford even a very modest home within reasonable commuting distance of work.
For example:
http://www.greaterfool.ca/2017/03/17/outta-here/
"My wife, daughter and myself currently live in Newmarket in a detached home that we purchased our home in late 2014 for $590,000 and it’s worth $1.1 million. That’s quite the profit in 2.5 years. So an option we are leaning towards is selling, and then renting for until we are ready to leave town and go north or east."
If it was just single family homes in prime areas it might be understandable, but the "bubble", or whatever it is, is now creeping into rent, leaving nowhere to hide.
It is your country. I think you should fight for it. Corruption comes in all shapes and sizes, and underhanded disenfranchisement is the insidious form it takes in NZ.
Popular opinion is that eventually the bubble will pop, but unless China itself pops, I think their economy is so relatively large that "this time really is different", if you don't own by now you, and your offspring, really will be priced out forever. It's a depressing realization.
As for fighting for your country.....as usual, it is the boomers who overwhelmingly own property, and it is boomers who show up at the polls on election day. Voters love making 10% to 30% tax free on their massively leveraged investments, they'll never vote for any policy that would threaten that.
Selling off properties to foreign owners isn't necessarily bad policy (it can bring in foreign capital, that is then transferred to a local owner or resident)
Highlighting NZ as exemplary is exactly the sort of reward that politicians need to be immune to attempts of corruption. It also creates an environment where people who go into public service do so with a concept of self that has "is not corrupt" as one strong component.
No one calls it corruption here. It's just capitalism? This has bothered me for years. I first learned about it in a realestate law class. My hand went straight up. Nothing has changed.
(They passed a feel good measure about a year ago that supposedly vets the money. I can't think of a country I can own realestate with a money transfer.)
This is not even remotely corruption.
I'd be interested in a city in a first world country that that actually downright forbids non-residents/foreigners from buying property. I very much doubt one exists.
Proof of living in the residence is necessary for some kinds of loans, so it's not a new concept. And the tax can be settled once every X years (maybe 3), or at home sale.
It's worth noting that Norway and Denmark have pretty strong restraints on "buy-to-let"
Take a look at Saint-Roch in Quebec City, for example. Two bedroom hip condo is around $200k. No car necessary, just walk around to buy stuff. In Halifax it would be around $240k for something downtown and walkable. In Toronto you'd be paying around $800k for these types of places.
I agree that there is a bubble, but it's mostly in BC and the GTA, everywhere else still seems like it hasn't jumped the shark.
It gets better though, so by february the worst bit is over. It's not really that awful - you really get a physical sense of the year progressing, and in a sense the darkness is cozy. Lots of light in the cities, starry skies in the countryside. Get some solarium tan going and spend a week or two of vacation time in warmer parts of the world and it's not at all bad.
I'm not gonna lie, it's tough. January is my least favorite month in the nordic countries.
As soon as February comes around things start getting better though. There's optimism in the air that while it's still cold and snowy (possibly even colder than January) spring is just around the corner. There's also plenty of winter sports around February and early March, such as the Vasa race[1], which is always fun.
Come April and May, when spring is in full force, the optimism reaches a fever pitch, culminating with midsummer eve in June. This is a huge part of the build up to the nordic summer, which is the most amazing thing you'll experience – in great contrast to the deep darkness of winter, the light simply never ends! If you're way up north, this is literal since the sun never actually sets. It's quite a sight.
Still, I've lived in other parts of the world with different climates and I wouldn't trade the nordic climate for anything. Like you say, the physical sense of the year progressing is something special, and even to the point that I almost get depressed without it. Certainly, if I miss the nordic summer I'm gutted.
I did plan many years ago to settle in America, but I found it hard to accept the values of American society. While still immensely fascinated by America, and envious of the opportunities, climates etc afforded Americans, I have a hard time stomaching the rampant materialism, shallowness, and disregard for the lesser off. The revenge and punishment oriented nature of American society puts me off. It has too many rules, which are too harshly and inhumanely enforced.
Spain was an option too, but with the massive unemployment, low salaries and the fact that I don't speak Spanish, it isn't an obvious choice. But I've decided I am going to try to learn some Spanish. Maybe if I can run my own business I don't have to care about low salaries.
The U.S is 14th.
Judging by the top entries in this list, GDP PP is a pretty good happiness predictor.
Using acronyms already adds some degree of ambiguity; shortening a commonly used acronym makes it basically unrecognizable, even when used within the proper context.
H2G2 9 times
HG2G 2 times
HHGTTG 2 times
Isn't diversity supposed to be a chance?
You have a harder time getting people to agree on policies and ideas when different culture are involved.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2013/05/16...
I don't think either dataset is gathered reliably, but if you're looking at a correlation there, there are glaring exceptions.
As somebody who lives in Canada, I think cultural compatibility is important, but ethnic homogeneity is unnecessary. Ethnicities are generally a proxy for cultures, Canada has a great deal of success in separating the two, though the prime minister doesn't seem to get it.
Anyway, not a hard-and-fast opinion, but I think ethnicity is a weak bond, and probably should be.
EDIT: those countries are getting better, but still...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_Switzerland
Im from south Europe where in my opinion we are quite happy, but at the same time we love to complain. Its just cultural, it doesnt mean that we hate our lifes, we just like to be negative some times :) I lived as well in a few countries of that list and I cannot say they are happier. I think they act happier.
Answering a "How are you today?" question differs among countries
In some countries people answer "awesome, and you?" and perhaps he/she just broke up with the couple.
In some other countries you would answe "Man, I feel so unlucky and terrible" but actually you just won lottery but rather than a million you got few thousand euros :)
just cultural... :)
My favorite restaurant in the area. :)
A similarly depressing thing I read is about people in Second Life simply recreating the houses they dream about in real life, despite having infinite possibilities.
There is a sense of real architectural visualization work going on. The process of constructing your dream house in 3D gives you a new way to see the house outside of your own mind.
Likely for most families you do not need to go back many generations to find a farmers origin.
For those it was not unusual to have some kind of cabin in the hills (4 walls and a roof, not much more than to keep the weather at bay) used for hunting and such.
So the idea of having a cabin to retreat to is ingrained.
In recent years though it seems to have taken on a bit of a caricature of itself as monied interests have taken to build clusters of "cabins" that are as well equipped as full on houses and selling them. You may liken it to tract housing.
And most of these are not bought with straight up money, but debt. One thing to note is that most of the top entries on the happiness list also are up top on the list of household debt, where housing and similar loans make up a big part.
Most of the nations, Norway included, is likely to have their own variant of a "subprime crisis" sooner rather than later.
EDIT: I'm an idiot, Norway actually has a rather low suicide rate, please disregard.
Just a thought
PS - What I find interesting about that table is, countries where it is socially acceptable to complain (and to "be sad") there is less suicide than in countries where the expectation is to be positive/happy all the time. Just kind of the inverse of what you'd expect, the UK having a low suicide rate is hilarious given how self-deprecating of a society we are.
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/2995521/7921609/3-160...
Page 4. First time asylum applicants declined with over 70% in all the Scandinavian countries.
For residents, it contributes to happiness to know that getting cancer would not just be life-threatening, but may also cost you your job, house, and savings.
For refugees, Scandinavia usually puts them up in modest apartments, provides a stipend in cash that covers necessities, and has a lot of programs to get them into work. The risk of your place going up in flames during the night is also a bit lower than elsewhere.
Other countries put refugees into rather filthy mass shelters, with just rows and rows of a hundred cots to sleep and instead of cash there's catering bought for $1 per meal.
Which countries do that?
The US gives little aid to refugees but has a lot more low skilled jobs, which they can do.
I know this is subjective but I'd claim Nordic countries are among the worlds least racist, so it makes it easier for foreigners. But let me qualify that. I think in Canada and the US you probably find a bigger chunk of the population without any kind of prejudice more ready to higher foreigners. Rather my claim as that extreme racism is very rare in Scandinavia. There might be a prevalence of a mild form of prejudice. But I think e.g. despite the US being in many areas more open minded you can have a lot more extreme bigotry and hatefulness towards minorities.
E.g. stuff like Neonazis and white supremacists is something I can only remember from the 80s in Norway, while it still seems to be a very real thing in America.
Londoners and many Brits are probably more open minded than many Scandinavians, but has Brexit showed there is quite extreme xenophobia alive and well in Britain which doesn't exist in a comparable form in Scandinavia.
Xenophobia is irrational hatred towards foreigners, while Brexiters had very rational qualms about them (mainly about lowering wages for jobs).
Freedom isn't always pleasant and happy, but it's better for the future of humanity. I've been all over the world and don't know anywhere that has as much freedom as the US.
The biggest difference you'll see is different cultures, but a culture doesn't tend to define itself by the state. Most cultures in the US are centered around geographical region (West Cost, Deep South, Midwest, etc) and even then vary wildly based on the city you're in (Buffalo is very different from NYC, Sacramento is very different from San Fransisco, Portland is very different from Eugene, etc).
The world's post-industrial history is extremely short, and everything we've seen thus far is some kind of historical accident. Other futures are always possible.
What does this have to do with freedom? It's about having basic safety nets for your citizens. "Freedom to fail", which is what you're describing, exists wherever you want it to exist so the country and even society is irrelevant.
> I've been all over the world and don't know anywhere that has as much freedom as the US.
Yes, it's nice to be affluent in the United States.