El Salvador near top on "Happy Planet Index"
El Salvador ranks in the top 10 countries in the world on the newly released Happy Planet Index of the New Economics Foundation. The Foundation describes its index as:
Get the full report here.
UPDATE:
You might also want to read this editorial critiquing the Happy Planet Index.
"An index of human well-being and environmental impact", [which] moves beyond crude ratings of nations according to national income, measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to produce a more accurate picture of the progress of nations based on the amount of the Earth's resources they use, and the length and happiness of people's lives.
The Happy Planet Index (HPI) strips the view of the economy back to its absolute basics: what we put in (resources), and what comes out (human lives of different length and happiness). The resulting Index of the 178 nations for which data is available, reveals that the world as a whole has a long way to go. In terms of delivering long and meaningful lives within the Earth's environmental limits - all nations could do better. No country achieves an overall 'high' score on the Index, and no country does well on all three indicators.
Get the full report here.
UPDATE:
You might also want to read this editorial critiquing the Happy Planet Index.
Comments
once they get there, they don't like the lifestyle, beging to be obese and depressed, and always homesick dreaming of coming back home to their paradise.
2 million salvadoreans in the usa knew by experience what "happy planet index" have put in numbers.
colombia and el salvador have high rates of crime, but that doesn't mean that there is a serial killer in every corner waiting for you. the violence here is concentrated in extreme poverty neighborhoods, and just in those where gangs have proliferated. violence and crime doesn't affect the dayly life of majority of population.
first surprise of western countries visitors to el salvador (and i dare to say even to colombia) is how different is here to the idea they have outside, mainly spreaded by media generalizations.
analizing happy planet index most happy nations are latinamerican.
is not strange to me that more unhappy are those nations depending of foreign oil to sustain their high consume lifestyles, and spreading war to keep the oil flowing to them. the other group of sad nations is formed of arab and asiatic nations atacked by usa and europe to have their oil resources.
we latin americans can consider lucky of not being petroleum producers, so powerful sad nations can let us live happy.
To send a letter to the editor of the Patriot-News, use this e-mail
address:
letters@patriot-news.com
Tim
Can you see how happy I am?
WALLY: part of happiness is the attitude wherewith we confront problems...cubans are happy though they hate their system, but they will not commit suicide in mass, or will stop laughing and dancing, they confront misery with joy, not with more misery, as most westeners would do...vanatuans, the nation in 1st place, are waiting their islands dissapear by ocean tsunamies, is inavoidable, will happen in the future, they can not solve it, then why to fall in panic or torture with anguish as westeners would expect they would do???
the market boom of latin american literature made famous writers and novels who were inspired by american writers like capote, hemingway, dos passos, and especially faulkner. macondo, the supposedly allegory of latin america, is in fact yoknapathawpha invented by the southern/usa writer faulkner. literature is art, not life. boom writers were smart to use selling techniques, and tortured themes learned in american and european literature. they were useful for propaganda needs in a specific moment in history, same history that now is forgotten them as new times are developing...
Frustrated, ambitious Americans, on the other hand have no where to go so they stay in the U.S. and mope.
Of course, we shouldn’t be so quick to condemn ambitious unhappy people. Who makes it possible for the rest of us live our happy-go-lucky easy life? People slaving away in offices and laboratories and fast-food restaurants driving the economy and sending remesas.
the ones that can not get that big amount of money are still here, the poorest of the poor, and they are smiling, caring, grateful, not unhappy at all, people.
You need to come up with an explanation for why Salvadorians are leaving “paradise”. You argue that Salvadorians go to the U.S. because they like the things they can buy with money, but they were really happier in El Salvador. Last I checked, consumption played some role in happiness (yes, I know - feeding, clothing, and educating our children are the trivial concerns of crass materialists, but we Salvadorians are a simple people).
If Salvadorians want to go back to paradise, why don’t they? (Of course many do head back to “paradise”, I have a friend from La Union who gave up TPS only to head back to the US again, got deported, then tried again a month later and succeeded – cost $12,000 plus a month in prison waiting to be deported)
I haven’t done a scientific survey, but my undocumented friends in the U.S. had annual incomes in the hundreds of dollars in El Salvador – they are plenty poor. Not one of them owned any land. They borrow money for their trip from distant relatives, cousins or in-laws, who came to the U.S. when it was easier.
Ok, so some poor people can’t afford to travel to the U.S. That doesn’t make them any happier. I don’t doubt that some unhappy people stay in El Salvador. The fact remains that people who move to the U.S. were disproportionately unhappy in El Salvador. If you take a third of the population that is disproportionately unhappy and send them abroad, your happiness index will go up. It’s basic arithmetic.
Finally, your definition of extreme poverty neighborhoods must include most of El Salvador if you think it only affects the extreme poor. I have lived in Ciudad Delgado, San Marcos and Cinco de Noviembre (near Esso). Crime affected me in each of these neighborhoods.
Your comment about obesity in the U.S. also betrays your limited recent experience with poor Salvadorians. If you haven’t noticed, obesity is a growing problem in El Salvador. Head to any poor neighborhood or market in El Salvador and you will see plenty of fat people. It must be nice to live in a rich-girl’s dreamworld where El Salvador is paradise. The rest of us must work to solve the problems staring us in the face.