US Drops Out of World’s Happiest Countries

(USNewsBreak.com) – Gallup has issued a list of the Happiest Countries in the World for the past dozen years. It included the United States in the top 20 for all of those. However, circumstances have changed dramatically this year, and now, none of the largest countries in the world rank among the happiest.

On Wednesday, March 20, Gallup released its 2024 World Happiness Report, reflecting some significant changes. First, Gallup and its partners ranked the countries by life evaluations from 2021 to 2023. Then, they broke down the happiness scale by age.

On the overall list, Finland remains the happiest country in the world. The Nordic nation has topped the list for the last seven years. Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, and Israel rounded out the top five. However, there’s bad news for Americans. Last year’s report listed the United States in 15th place. This year, it’s fallen eight spots to number 23. Germany also took a dip and now ranks 24th. However, new additions to the top 20 include Kuwait and Costa Rica.

US no longer in top 20 of world's happiest countries and is now behind Kuwait, Lithuania, UAE https://t.co/bN4CYL0ECd pic.twitter.com/jgJP66F5GD

— Voice of Europe 🌍 (@V_of_Europe) March 21, 2024

When broken down by age, there are two categories: those under age 30 and those over age 60. The lineup changed a bit when pollsters applied this distinction. The top countries for each age group, respectively, were Lithuania and Denmark. The US does make an appearance in the top 10 in this respect. It came in 10th place among the over-60 crowd.

However, the report went into detail regarding happiness inequality, a measure of the difference in happiness levels between the age groups. It found that the gap is growing between the young and old and that younger people are generally unhappier. The distance has increased by more than 20% over the past 12 years, according to Gallup. The unhappiest of the younger groups exist in New Zealand, Canada, Australia, and the US, and women tend to feel more unhappy than men, according to the study.