What makes Filipinos happy? The answer is simple: family and friends.
Based on the World Happiness Report 2015, having social support, consisting of family and friends who are ready to help in times of need, is the main reason Filipinos are happy.
Apart from a strong support system, other top reasons that make Filipinos happy are higher incomes and the freedom to make life choices.
“Countries with sufficiently high quality social capital appear to be able to sustain or even improve subjective well-being in the face of natural disasters or economic shocks, as the shocks provide them an opportunity to discover, use and build upon their communal links,” the report stated.
However, Filipinos are least happy about corruption. Filipinos still believe that corruption is still widespread in the government and businesses in the country.
Compared to other countries in the report, the Philippines was ranked 90th out of 158 countries with a score of 5.073 out of a perfect 10. While its happiness score improved by 0.219 between 2005 and 2007 to 2012 and 2014, it is the least happy compared to its Asean counterparts.
Singaporeans, ranked 24th out of 158 with a score of 6.798 out of 10, are the happiest in the Asean because of their high incomes and healthy life expectancy. This was followed by Thailand, which ranked 34th with a score of 6.455, due to a strong support system and higher incomes similar to that of the Philippines. Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam followed by ranking 61st with a score of 5.770; 74th, 5.399; and 75th, 5.36, respectively.
The happiness of these three countries were largely due to strong social support and higher incomes.
Among these Asean countries, the least source of their happiness comes from perceptions of widespread corruption, except for Singapore. In Singapore the least source of happiness was the level of generosity. The report stated that this is measured by the donations made to charitable institutions in the past month.
Overall, Switzerland, Iceland, Denmark and Norway topped the rankings. All four countries have average scores between 7.5 and 7.6, and the differences between them are not statistically significant.
The rest of the top 10 (in order) are Canada, Finland, the Netherlands, Sweden, New Zealand and Australia, all with average scores above 7.28. There is more turnover, almost half, among the bottom 10 countries, all with average ladder scores below 3.7.
The World Happiness Report ranked countries according to incomes or gross domestic product per capita; social support; healthy life expectancy; freedom to make life choices; generosity; and perceptions of corruption.
Gallup Inc. provided data used in connection with the preparation of the World Happiness Report.
The report is edited by Prof. John F. Helliwell of the University of British Columbia and the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research; Lord Richard Layard, director of the Well-Being Programme at LSE’s Centre for Economic Performance; and Prof. Jeffrey D. Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University.