69th Place: Philippines happier now based on World Happiness Report 2019

Is happiness really in the air?

Apparently, it is, at least based on the 2019 World Happiness Report released yesterday that says the Philippines is among the top 20 “gainers” this year. This means that the country is significantly happier than the average ranking from 2005-2008.

The annual study by the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network ranked the Philippines the 69th happiest out of 156 countries this year. While this is quite low, it’s two ranks higher than last year.

The Philippines was also ranked the third happiest country in Southeast Asia this year, just below Singapore and Thailand which ranked first and second in the region, respectively.

The study was based on factors like GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom, generosity, and absence of corruption.

Among these variables, the Philippines got the lowest rank for generosity at the 115th place while it ranked the highest for freedom at number 15.

The Philippines also ranked 42 in positive affect and 116 in negative affect.

Finland topped the list again after being named the happiest country in the world last year. The top 10 includes:

1. Finland
2. Denmark
3. Norway
4. Iceland
5. Netherlands
6. Switzerland
7. Sweden
8. New Zealand
9. Canada
10. Austria

For the second time in a row, Finland landed as the happiest country in the world, followed by Denmark, the global report said.

Norway ranked third, while Iceland and the Netherlands placed fourth and fifth, respectively.

Meanwhile, the United Kingdom placed 15th and the United States ranked 19th.

In the report, South Sudan was the least happy country in the world, placing 156th.

Here is the full list:

This article originally appeared on: https://news.yahoo.com/philippines-happier-now-based-world-023926630.html