Where does Cyprus rank on the happiness index?

Residents in Austria are the happiest of all EU countries, with citizens being the most satisfied with their lives, while Cypriots are in the middle of the scale and Greeks at the bottom.

Austria scored 7.9 out of 10 in Eurostat's annual publication of "quality of life indicators", which is based on surveys of all member states.

Poland, Finland and Romania were joint second with a score of 7.7 out of 10, while at the other end of the scale, Bulgaria had the lowest score, being the only country to score less than a six (5.6 ), while the rating is low in Germany (6.5) and Greece (6.7).

Cyprus ranks 15th in the happiness index.

Eurostat said its publication aims to "capture trends in the subjective well-being of European citizens", noting that "EU citizens tended to be quite satisfied with their lives in general, reporting an average of 7.1 points out of 10".

It is noted that factors such as level of education, family and financial stability influenced respondents' overall life satisfaction rather than just wealth.

What do the ratings show?

In 2022, Europeans rated their life satisfaction on average 7.1 points on a scale of 0 (very dissatisfied) to 10 (very satisfied).

Latvia and Croatia also showed fairly low levels of satisfaction at 6.8. However, in all countries except Bulgaria, average levels of life satisfaction were higher than 6, meaning that survey respondents were more satisfied than dissatisfied.

It is interesting to note that some countries associated with low income levels in the recent past, such as Romania and Poland, are among the countries where life satisfaction is highest - showing the complexity of the relationship between subjective well-being and economic well-being.

Life satisfaction can be influenced by many factors such as age, level of education, family and financial status.

Young people enjoy life

The data shows that young people in the EU were more satisfied with their lives than older people.

In 2022, in most Member States, 16-29-year-olds showed higher life satisfaction than over-65s.

The opposite in this respect was observed in Denmark, Sweden, Ireland, the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Finland.

The difference between the subjective well-being of young people compared to the over-65s was greatest in Croatia (+1.6 points), Bulgaria (+1.4 points), Lithuania (+1.3 points) and Slovakia (+1.2 points).

In Germany the two age groups had the same average life satisfaction. In Denmark over-65s had the biggest advantage in life satisfaction compared to young people: 0.9 points.

Young people's life satisfaction ranged between 6.3 in Bulgaria and 8.1 in Romania and Poland, while for the over-65s it was as low as 4.9 in Bulgaria and as high as 8.0 in Denmark.

The educated are happier

In addition to the effect of age, life satisfaction appeared to depend on education level, which to some extent reflected income levels.

In every Member State, life satisfaction increased in parallel with the level of education.

The largest gap between those with tertiary education and those with primary (below secondary) education was observed in Slovakia (difference 1.6 points), Romania and Bulgaria (1.5), as well as Slovenia, Croatia and Hungary (difference of 1.2 points).

Happier in cities?

According to the data, while at EU level, the data showed no difference in life satisfaction between urban and rural areas, opposite trends are observed at member state level.

In Malta, Austria, Finland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Ireland, Sweden, Denmark and Luxembourg people in rural areas reported being slightly happier (by at least 0.2 points).

On the other hand, in Bulgaria, Romania, Lithuania, Slovakia, Portugal, Hungary, Croatia, Cyprus, Germany and Slovenia people in cities reported higher levels of life satisfaction.

The biggest difference was seen in Bulgaria, where the average life satisfaction of people living in cities was 0.8 points higher than those living in rural areas.Money and children bring happiness

A higher level of income and children made Europeans more satisfied with life overall.

It shows that life satisfaction at the EU level depended to some extent on household type, hardly on gender and quite on income level.

Regarding the type of household a person lives in, people in households with dependent children consistently reported the highest levels of life satisfaction.

In 2022, at EU level, this was 7.3, compared to an average of 7.1 for cohabiting couples, 7.0 for households with three or more adults and no dependent children and 6.7 for households with one atom.

The fact that households with dependent children were more satisfied than those without is rather specific to the European context, as research on other continents has often found the opposite.

Between 2018 and 2022, life satisfaction declined the most (-0.3 points) for households with dependent children, although they continued to report the highest life satisfaction.

During this period, life satisfaction also fell slightly for all other types of households: 0.2 points for households without dependent children and those consisting of two adults and 0.1 points for households with one person and households with three or more adults.

Very little difference was found in people's life satisfaction by gender. The change between 2018 and 2022 was not uniform, falling slightly more for men (-0.3 points) than for women (-0.2 points), with an EU average of 7.1 in 2022.

Source: stockwatch.com.cy

Photo: stockwatch.com.cy