The 2025 World Happiness Report Has Been Released, Finland Ranked Happiest Country for 8th Straight Year, United States Ranks Lower Than Ever
(Source: https://worldhappiness.report)
CBS - The United States this year fell to its lowest-ever place on the World Happiness Report, an annual survey published on International Day of Happiness. The 2025 report highlights the positive effects benevolence and social connections have on people's life satisfaction.
Finland remained the happiest nation for the eighth year in a row, while Mexico and Costa Rico ranked among the top 10 for the first time since the report was first published in 2012.
This year's report ranks 147 countries by their happiness levels — based on a population's average assessment of their quality of life from 2022 to 2024. Data from the Gallup World Poll, which asks respondents to evaluate their current life, is the primary source for the annual happiness rankings.
The god damn Nordics. How much longer are we just going to accept that the coldest, northern most part of Europe is the happiest place on Earth? Any time you see any sort of "Where are people happiest?" rankings, it's always Scandinavia and Scandinavian adjacent countries at the top. This is the 8th year in a row Finland has been named the happiest country. Last year's survey had the identical top 4 of Finland, Denmark, Iceland, and Sweden. I'm starting to get suspicious that they've come to an agreement with each other to always give high marks on their happiness surveys, just to make the rest of the world think they've got something figured out that we don't. I'm not sure why they would do it. Maybe they're just trying to convince themselves that shoveling their cars out of the driveway every morning is worth it. Maybe they're trying to lure people there for Midsommer. Idk. I haven't thought this theory out in the slightest. But I'm on to you Nordics. Just because you guys trust your government, have functioning universal healthcare systems, have virtually zero poverty, are surrounded by beautiful nature, and get PlayStation 2's in prison (even if you do something as heinous as shoot up a children's camp). I'm not entirely sold on your happiness.
Unfortunately, the United States turned in their lowest score in the history of the survey. Apparently we're only the 24th happiest country in the world. Just slightly less happy than the United Arab Emirates. We got beat out by Dubai. We're only the 4th happiest country in North America. I was surprised to learn how happy the Costa Ricans are. It's a beautiful country and all. I went there once and had a swell time. But I didn't necessarily clock Scandinavian levels of joy. Canada I understand being ranked higher. All you ever hear about Canadians is how friendly they are. But Mexico being a full 14 spots higher than us.. that's interesting. The flow of traffic over the U.S.-Mexico border kind of implies otherwise. We gotta get the World Happiness Report in the hands of our boarder patrol. We should plaster the rankings all along the border fence. That'll make people think twice about trying to cross into America illegally. "Would you look at that... I thought we had it bad here. Turns out it's even less happy on the other side. Silly me. Guess I'll turn around and head to Costa Rica."
I couldn't help but notice North Korea didn't get a happiness score. I really wish they had. They'd probably come in first place by a landslide every year out of fear that the survey was a trap. That giving a bad happiness score would land them in North Korean rat prison. Obviously we would all know that the ranking is bullshit, but North Korea being at the top of the World Happiness Report every year would be the perfect piece of hilariously fake Kim Jong Un propaganda.
And lastly, as secure are Finland is at the top of the rankings, the saddest country in the world is even more set in stone. By a long shot. Like, it's not even close.
My god, Afghanistan. I suppose that's what you get when you ban half of your population from looking out windows. That's how you end up with a non-existent 'Freedom to Make Life Choices' bar. What a fumble by the Taliban to allow the people of Afghanistan to get their hands on this survey. If you're going to go full religious heel and commit to making your country as miserable of a place to live as possible so that you'll get to swim in a pool of virgins when you die, you can't be letting your people fill out "Are we happy?" surveys. Big misstep on their part. Nobody does PR worse than Afghanistan. They could learn a thing or two from North Korea.
P.S. I just found that in 2011, North Korea released their own happiness study. I can't find their full rankings, but there are a handful of old articles on it. Surprisingly, North Korea did not come in first. They came in second. The top 5 were:
1. China
2. North Korea
3. Cuba
4. Iran
5. Venezuela
South Korea was 152nd, and United States was dead last. Take notes Afghanistan.