Country in 60th position for 2025
Portugal has fallen five places in the World Happiness Report 2025, released today, to a world where many might say ‘happiness can only be relative’, given what is happening in various parts of the globe.
But taking it at its most basic level, Portugal’s happiness is now ranked in 60th position, with a score of 6,103 points, compared to 6,030 in 2024.
This study – published by Oxford University’s Wellbeing Research Centre, and carried out in partnership with the Gallup analysis company and the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network – still considers Finland to be the happiest country in the world (for the eighth consecutive year), ahead of other Nordic countries, which once again top the ranking.
Considering Finland’s prime minister was looking anything but happy yesterday, in the company of Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and warning of the threats to his own country’s and Europe’s safety, one can appreciate how divorced from reality this study has become. For example, Israel is considered the 8th most happy country in the world (in spite of having large parts of its population protesting regularly against the bellicose nature of its government). Afghanistan, however, remains in last place (147th) in the index – and no one would argue with that.
So how is this rarefied ranking calculated? It all depends on answers to surveys in which people are asked to evaluate their own lives, and “experts in economics, psychology, sociology and others try to explain the variations between countries (…) using factors such as Gross Domestic Product per capita, healthy life expectancy, whether respondents have someone to count on, feelings of freedom, generosity and perceptions of corruption”.
The surveys do not appear to ask people questions about how they are feeling about the general direction of the world/ or its political leaders: the answers seem to centre on simple things, like “sharing meals with other people, having someone to rely on for social support, and the size of the household”.
In Mexico and Europe, for example, a household of four or five people is what predicts the highest levels of happiness, according to the study.
“Believing in the goodness of others is also much more closely linked to happiness than previously thought. By way of example, the report suggests that people who believe that others are willing to return their wallet if they lose it are a strong indicator of a population’s overall happiness. The Nordic countries are among the top places when it comes to the expected and actual return of a lost wallet, according to the study,” writes Lusa.
The United States, where so many citizens have fallen into states of despair/ depression since the re-election of President Trump, happiness levels are at their lowest position yet (24th, compared to 11th in 2011). But this has little to do with Donald Trump. According to the study, it is more connected to the isolation people feel in their immediate lives: “the number of people who dine alone has increased by 53% in the last two decades”.
One salient finding of the study, released to commemorate the International Day of Happiness (March 20) appears to be that “almost a fifth of young adults worldwide report having no social support. By 2023, 19% of young adults worldwide reported that they have no one they can rely on for social support. This is an increase of 39% compared to 2006”. ND
Source material: LUSA
