Finns say they’re happier and more satisfied with life in general, compared with other people in Europe.
That’s the findings of a recent survey from the European Statistical Office Eurostat.
Overall, Europeans are generally happier now than they were five years ago but Finns are more happy than most.
In 2018 Finns scored 8.1 on a life satisfaction scale from 1 to 10, closely followed by Austrian, Danes, Poles and Swedes.
At the other end of the scale are residents from Bulgaria who were by far the least satisfied, after Croatians, Greeks and Lithuanians.
On average, life satisfaction of EU residents was rated at 7.3 in the Eurostat survey - that’s an increase of 0.3 compared to 2013 data.
Satisfaction with the financial situation of the household varied most between EU member states, but Finland topped that list as well - alongside Denmark and Sweden.
How often are you happy?
As a part of the survey, people were also asked how often they were happy.
The answer is - remarkably often!
Eurostat found that more than 62% of people in the European Union reported being happy all the time or most of the time.
Finns were the happiest - alongside with Austrians, Belgians and Dutch - as 76 per cent of them claimed to feel happy all or most of the time.
The findings of the survey might come as something of a surprise, given the social and political uncertainty across Europe in recent years.
Eurosceptic and populist parties have emerged in a number of countries, but the fact still
is, that in most European countries, people live longer, enjoy greater prosperity and better health than at any time in history. ̈
And that, if nothing else, can lead to happiness and satisfaction.
