INEQUALITY-ADJUSTED HAPPINESS IN 149 NATIONS 2010-2018
How well nations combine level and differences in happiness

Technical details

1. Happiness assessed by means of surveys in general public samples.
   • This list is based on responses to a single question on life-satisfaction.
   • Data on average happiness in nations are taken from Rank Report Average Happiness.
   • Data on standard deviation of happiness in nations are taken from Rank Report Inequality of Happiness .


2. In this ranking the focus is not only on the level of happiness in the country, but also on inequality in happiness among citizens.
   • Inequality in happiness can be measured by the dispersion of responses to survey-questions. The degree of dispersion can be expressed statistically in the standard deviation.
   • This choice of statistic is explained in more detail in Kalmijn, W. & Veenhoven, R,  Measuring Inequality of Happiness in Nations. In Search for Proper Statistics in: Journal of Happiness Studies, 2005, vol. 6, pp. 357-396 .


3. Inequality-Adjusted-Happiness (IAH) is measured as a linear combination of the mean and the standard deviation of the distribution of happiness in a nation. The IAH values in this report are based on the choice to give equal weight to level and dispersion of happiness.

• This index is expressed in the following formula: IAH = 8.28 (m – s) + 17.2, where m is the mean response to a question on happiness in a nation and s is the sample standard deviation of the responses, happiness being measured with a 0 to 10 scale ranging from most unhappy (0) to most happy (10).

• On this index a score of 100 means that everybody is completely happy; e.g. that all respondents in the sample rated their happiness 10 on a 0 to10 scale.

• This measure was first presented at the conference of the International Society for Quality Of Life Studies (ISQOLS) in Frankfurt, July 2003. It is presented in more detail in Veenhoven, R. & Kalmijn, W. Inequality-Adjusted Happiness (IAH) in Nations. Egalitarianism and Utilitarianism Married in a New Index of Societal Performance. in: Journal of Happiness Studies, 2005, vol. 6, pp. 421-455 .

• A more elegant computation was proposed in 2011 in the paper Index of Inequality Adjusted happiness (IAH) improved. This latter method is applied in this rank list.

4. This list is included in SPSS datafile  States of Nations as variable IAH_LSBW10.11_2005.14 .

Cite as:
Veenhoven, R., Inequality-Adjusted Happiness in 149 nations 2010-2018 . World Database of Happiness, Rank report Inequality of Happiness, Internet: worlddatabaseofhappiness-archive.eur.nl/hap_nat/findingreports/RankReport_InequalityHappiness.php