Finland is the world's happiest country, according to an annual survey issued on Wednesday that put Burundi at the bottom of the happiness index and found Americans were getting less happy even as their country became richer.

 

根据周三发布的一项年度调查，芬兰是世界上最幸福的国家，布隆迪在幸福指数排名中垫底。尽管美国正变得更加富有，但美国人民却越来越不快乐。

 

The UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network's (SDSN) 2018 World Happiness Report ranked 156 countries according to their scores for things such as GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy¹, social freedom, generosity² and absence of corruption³.

 

Finland, rose from fifth place last year to oust⁴ Norway from the top spot. The 2018 top-5, as ever dominated by the Nordics, is: Finland, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and Switzerland.

 

The United States came in at 18th, down from 14th place last year. Britain was 19th and the United Arab Emirates 20th.

 

One chapter of the 170-page report is dedicated⁵ to emerging health problems such as obesity⁶, depression and the opioid crisis, particularly in the United States where the prevalence of all three has grown faster than in most other countries.

 

While income per capita has increased markedly in the United States over the last half century, the happiness index has been hit by weakened social support networks, a rise in perception of corruption in government and business and declining confidence in public institutions.

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