Deutsche Bank on happiness

Deutsche Bank has published a substantial report on happiness. Stefan Bergheim, one of the bank’s economists, uses a statistical “cluster analysis” to identify what he says are 10 “indicators for a happy society”:

1)High degree of trust in fellow citizens

2)Low amount of corruption

3)Low unemployment

4)High level of education

5)High income

6)High employment rate of older people

7)Small shadow economy

8)Extensive economic freedom

9)Low employment protection

10)High birth rate

Strangely, America and Britain are classified by Deutsche Bank as happy societies. This is in contrast to much of the internal debate within these countries which sees them as unhappy.

It is also notable that the paper argues that happiness and life satisfaction should be explicit policy objectives. So now we have a bank saying that governments should concern themselves with making us happy – presumably whether we like it or not.