A better life or entitled problems?
ONCE upon a time statistics were produced that showed that Guernsey was the happiest place in the world.
It's been referred to for years since. It was probably the foundation for the political and popular movements which have pursuing 'happiness' in the past few decades.
The publication of the States version of the OECD’s Better Life Index tells a rather different tale of modern life today. Guernsey scores well in most areas, but, unsurprisingly, very poorly over the cost of housing. Most of our other low scores seem to be caused more by affluence and complacency, and our response, than genuine hardship.
And levels of self-reported life satisfaction in Guernsey are well below many of the world’s leading nations at 6.7 out of 10, although the island rates highly in many of the areas of directly comparable data.
So much so we find ourselves 32 in a list of 35 developed nations, with similarly high-performing South Korea and Japan lower.
Meanwhile the Mexicans, lowly in many of the lists, plump themselves in the top three as happy with their lot.
Leaves us thinking. Are we really badly off? Or just feeling disadvantaged against our lofty expectations? One suspects our high point has declined since the late 1980s, but maybe sometimes we should also count our blessings.