The Czech Republic Ranks 16th Happiest Country in the World

March 20, 2021

Who doesn’t need some happy news these days? Just in time for the United Nation’s annual International Day of Happiness on March 20, the results of the 2021 World Happiness Report have been released—and the results will put a smile on your face, despite the ongoing pandemic that has killed more than 2.6 million people around the globe.

Finland has been named the happiest place in the world for the fourth year running, in an annual UN-sponsored report.

The World Happiness Report saw Denmark in second place, then Switzerland, Iceland, and the Netherlands. Data from analytics researcher Gallup asked people in 149 countries to rate their own happiness.

Measures including social support, personal freedom, gross domestic product (GDP) and levels of corruption were also factored in.

“We need urgently to learn from Covid-19,” said report co-editor Jeffrey Sachs, professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University.

“The pandemic reminds us of our global environmental threats, the urgent need to cooperate, and the difficulties of achieving cooperation in each country and globally.”

Besides the happiest countries in the world, the Happiness Report also looked at the places where people are the most miserable. This year, countries like Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Tanzania and Jordan were ranked as some of the unhappiest countries in the world.

Launched in 2012, the World Happiness Report is an annual survey conducted by the U.N.’s Sustainable Development Solutions Network. The survey ranks global happiness in countries around the world.

Typically, the statisticians base the ranking on data from the Gallup World Poll. But this year was a bit different. Since the researchers were unable to do face-to-face interviews in a number of countries, they focused on the relationship between well-being and Covid-19 in order to rank the countries.

World’s 20 Happiest Countries