“Who can deny that peace is preferable to war? Who can deny that freedom is preferable to dictatorship? Who can deny that quality of life is better than misery? Who can deny that, as Danton said, “After bread, education is the first need of the people”? We can therefore, from these four chapters, find for each of them significant indicators of the evolution of what we have called global happiness and happiness by country.
This is what the UNDP, the main United Nations agency for international development, started doing in 1990, by defining the three elements: GDP (Gross Domestic Product, editor’s note), hope life at birth and the level of education, which form the basis of the human development indicator (HDI). Our World Happiness Index (IBM) is a complement and an extension of this, insofar as it takes into account not three, but forty elements,” explains Pierre Le Roy.
“Not all the lights are red”
Among these elements, the historian retains military expenditure in the world, the number of long-range operational nuclear charges, corruption, violent deaths, displaced persons, deaths due to natural and technological disasters, economic security and countries’ finances, women’s rights, etc.
Blue Monday: the most depressing day that was a (big) joke
In 2022, the IBM calculated by Pierre Le Roy recorded 25% better since the year 2000, but a deterioration due to the pandemic, in 2020, compared to 2019 which had experienced stagnation compared to 2018: “It is a bad period, comparable to that of the years 2009-2010, due to the subprime crisis! However, let us remember the very favorable development since the year 2000: not all the lights are red, quite the contrary! »
Ahmed Taghaza
