Finland ranked happiest country in the world - again.

Finland has been named the happiest country for a fourth year running.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-56457295

Full List at the bottom of this page:

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/happiest-countries-in-the-world

That is nice but hard pass. Do not like cold.

My fundamental problem with that list is that “happiness” is a relative term and what constitutes an “acceptable” standard of living also varies form country to country. Having said that, Finland has two major aspects that helps with its high “happiness” rating. It has a largely homogenous population and a low population density.

I think it's because hockey is such a big sport there.

When I was a kid in Yankeeland, we were hockey NUTZ. My dad found this old Finn, first name Reno (sp?) who had a regulation rink he had built in his back yard! He had a Sauna too, and a nice frozen pond to jump into after.

I loved the rink, the rest was way beyond my 10 yr old Yankee puritanism.

The old fart slammed me against his boards more than once...always acted like he didn't like me. Then one night...yeah he had lights too, I got a chance to "politely" check him on his butt after bouncing him off his own boards when he was off balance.

He and I got along great after that. Sometimes I wonder where my life would have gone if we hadn't moved to Florida a couple of years later. I was a really good hockey player for a kid. For sure I would have learned to fight good earlier than I did.

Cool story Nixer. It might have not been that he didn't like you. It might have been that you where flying around out there and scoring too easily. That might be why he gave you a ride into the boards. The fact that you gave him one back probably got him to respect you. If you hadn't, he would have just kept on doing it.

Iceland is another one that perfectly fits the profile I described earlier. The population is about 99% Caucasian and less than 400k people live in the country.

When I think of Iceland, I think of that 90's band the Sugarcubes. Bjork certainly was original. I have a friend who works for Cerner Health in Sweden. He just got transferred there last year. He and his wife love it there. Norway, Finland, and Sweden all look to be great places to visit.

Are Finlandan women pretty?

That's an extremely generalized question don't you think?

Only if you can afford the astronomical cost of living.

I don't think his question is any more generalized than your assumption that only homogeneous people can be happy.

It's all relative though & someone living in the cheaper areas in the USA might say the same of e.g. visiting Beverly Hills. Here in the UK it is significantly dearer to live in London than most other parts of the country but the wages are higher to compensate.
& of course there are major differences in life/lifestyle in Scandinavia e.g. good & inexpensive public transport, universal healthcare & high social care/unemployment benefits. The important metric is what you can do/get with what you are left with after all normal expenditure. Are you familiar with The Big Mac Index (& it's variants)? https://www.economist.com/big-mac-index

I wonder what has changed in Finland.
It used to be notorious for high rates of suicide and alcoholism, mainly due to isolation and short daylight hours during the long winter.
Communication, information, entertainment and social media access thanks the the world Wide Web has improved citizens' lives mayhap

Homogenous societies don't experience racial strife and tension at anywhere near the major levels that countries like the US do. Don't misunderstand me, I'm NOT saying that societies need to be homogenous but I am simply making an observation of the inevitable consequences that can result when you have a society with multiple different races and religions. It's human nature that I am critiquing here.

And who pays for that? The taxpayers of course so that needs to be figured into the "cost of living" equation. It is not a separate entity.

Pretty women are abundant all over the world. All nationalities have beautiful women.

& that's why I said "The important metric is what you can do/get with what you are left with after all normal expenditure". Tax is taken off before you are left with whatever you are left with.

My current home, Denmark, second (first or second nearly every year) and I can only reflect on my own experience ...

- I work which makes me happy
- I get paid which makes me happy
- I then give half of every dollar I own back to the government which makes me unhappy
- Of the half I have left, the government takes 25% again in sales tax any time I buy something which makes me unhappyer
- My daughter got Corona but I never had to worry about her care because doctors and hospitals are free and well resourced and medicine is subsidised so that makes me happy
- She starts University in July and not only is that free, but the government pays her an allowance because she is studying, so that makes me happy
- She doesn't need a car, she rides her bike everywhere on nice bike paths and if she needs to take a bus or train or metro it comes on time so that makes me happy
- My son works at a childcare center where childcare is subsidized and his salary is paid by government and my wife works at a healthcare center and her salary is paid by government so I guess I can see where all my tax money goes so that makes me happy
- Beer is cheaper than bottled water, so that makes me happy
- The supermarkets are full of wine from all over the world so that makes me happy
- Soccer is the biggest sport and it is really boring compared to almost any other sport in the universe so that makes me unhappy
- Crime rate is low and I never have to worry about being shot because no one has guns except the police, so that makes me happy because the chances of the police shooting me are pretty low (so far)
- We have been in and out of lockdown a few times and each time there is no big fuss, people follow the recommendations for a few weeks and it works and then we can open up again, so that makes me happy
- We are vaccinating people now and all the oldies have been vaccinated, and all the healthworkers have been vaccinated and now all the vulnerable people are being vaccinated and pretty soon it will be my turn and now corona hospitalisations are falling dramatically because of vaccination so that makes me happy
- And did I mention beer is cheaper than bottled water?

So on balance yep, pretty happy.

Pretty sure Finland does not have a media/government, hellbent on a race war.

and tipping is not necessary

I guess that applies to the media and government in the UK, France and Germany since the racial and religious tensions are very bad as well in those countries.

Another observation about the top 10 countries in the list which are:

Finland
Denmark
Switzerland
Iceland
Netherlands
Norway
Sweden
Luxembourg
New Zealand
Austria



The populations of these countries range from a high of 17 million for the Netherlands to a low of 364,000 for Iceland. It seems having a small population is key to this "happiness".

Switzerland = chocolate. Chocolate = happy happy happy happy.

I guess I figure there are a few components of "being happy"
The first is feeling confident that your basic needs of food and housing are met. In today's world that equals either a stable income or a good social security net.
After that comes feelings of belonging, community, friends, etc.
After that comes pretty much anything else.

It's hard to be happy if you are worried about paying rent in 2 weeks, or if you are hungry and can't get anything to eat.

so why doesn't Belgium make it into the top 10 then? German & British chocolate is also pretty good ...

Meh, Switzerland is basically the same as Germany minus those weirdos who speak French and Italian.

As for the British, do they make any good food at all?

Belgium, German, British make chocolate?

You should watch Royal Recipes. https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/programmes/b08cb8gg/episodes

Of course it does. It is not just an issue in the USA, I did not imply that it was.

Cadbury chocolate is good. I'm not a big chocolate bar guy, but when I do get one it is a Cadbury's Crispy Crunch. My wife loves the mini eggs (they are very good).

From the top 10, I would 100 percent pick New Zealand as my top choice

We didn't.....too busy expanding the Empire to bother about fancy cooking Old Chap.

if you are talking about the catering industry, thanks to foreign influence, immigration, and enterprise, things have vastly improved here in the last 4 decades.

You're a huge Lord of the Rings and Hobbit fan aren't you?

The best food in Britain is the stuff that isn't British.

I LOVE British food. Steak and Ale Pie. Steak and Kidney Pie , Cornish Pasties, sausage rolls, Sunday Roast at the pub or carvery, Balmoral Chicken....I have travelled all through western Europe and North and Central America. I still like nothing better than a good solid British meal.

As for chocolate. Cadbury is garbage since it was sold to Nestle some years ago. If you look closely at the bars most are not even called chocolate any more but are labelled "chocolatey candy". Lindt and Green & Blacks ( Swiss and English ) are the best I can find these days.

Lindt is indeed very good and I eat those individually wrapped chocolates like nobody's business.

The irony with Nestle is that it's a SWISS company so you'd think the quality of Cadbury would not have declined after the buy-out.

haggis???

How many different pastas are there? https://www.delish.com/uk/food-news/g31017969/pasta-shapes/

I would love to move there.

Polish kielbasa and buttered salty cheesy pierogies would like to have a word with you...

Total population is only 4.7 million so I'm sure they have room for you.

Srry have to ask Spidey. What's yer favorite breed of sheep then?

Cadbury was bought by Mondelez (what was Kraft, an US company) not Nestle - & I do agree that it has gone downhill since Mondelez bought it. Costcutting/changes in ingredients & bar/packet etc. size I could imagine that the decline is even worse in products produced outside the UK for non-UK markets..
Green & Black's was bought by Cadbury in 2005 & was of course subsumed into Mondelez.

A Cumberland or Lincolnshire sausage with some mash and marrowfat peas is more to my liking ....never ever did see the appeal of perogies

The Ukrainian in me loves perogies. My Grandma us to make great ones. She would make them from scratch, a lot of work. My Grandma's brothers were Boxers and wrestlers. They were tough Ukes as my Dad use to say.
Two of her brothers are in The Brantford, Ontario Sports Hall of Fame. (may have heard of somebody else from Brantford). One as a Boxer the other as a wrestler. Depression era.