Good News Bulletin

Here is the news: the world is getting happier. Now, I wouldn’t blame you if you were to scoff – what with that ‘fake news’ controversy raging – or if you were to say it doesn’t feel like it (we all have our worries) but, from my point of view, the argument certainly holds up. I have spent some days during these autumnal weeks hiking in classically picturesque English countryside and among orchards of “mellow fruitfulness” on crisp sunny days, when Nature’s colours reflect the light so brightly that every vista is a classic photo-op – a temptation to indulge Excessive Instagram Syndrome.

You would be right, of course, to object that my evidence of universal well-being is a) anecdotal and b) personal, so perhaps we should stick to measurable statistics. The World Happiness Report 2016 demonstrates a continuous upward trend in happiness, in so far as it correlates rising incomes with measures of life-satisfaction: as countries get richer over time, their people get happier. Happyologists (those who work in this sector of social science) face a degree of scepticism, rightly so, as they are dealing with a slippery concept. One line of lyric from Ken Dodd’s enduringly popular song sums up the difficulty of framing the questionnaire: “I’ve got no silver and I’ve got no gold but I’ve got happiness in my soul”. He is right: happiness depends on much more than wealth. Many factors affect the way we feel – and these are duly recognised and enumerated by researchers – nevertheless, wealth does play a fundamental part, the old refrain “we were poor but we were happy” notwithstanding . Subsistence, let’s face it, cannot be a joyful experience.

The fact that, country-by-country, people are becoming wealthier and happier is a good-news story, though it is not one that the media are inclined to headline. It goes against their tendency to be anxiogenic – inducing anxiety – and to foster alarm. It is said that pessimists sound like they are trying to help you, but optimists sound like they are trying to sell you something, in which case a daily dose of pessimism is a neat way to hook your public. That said, editors often make an effort to include a cheerful story in their content, so as to introduce balance and offer us hope that not all the world is doomed. From a consumer’s point of view, it would be nice to take this further and to have a distinct choice between optimistic and pessimistic news channels, so that we could reassure ourselves either that things are going well or badly depending on our disposition. Even then, however, there is another issue: that of the disjointed presentation of random facts. Heart-warming or despair-inducing, we would still be consuming a day-to-day account of a string of incidents that do not coalesce into a bigger story – the equivalent of a play-by-play sports commentary. For a better understanding of the changing state of the world and the direction in which it is heading, we could use more stories along the lines of “Number of people in extreme poverty fell by 137,000 since yesterday, every day for the last 25 years”  brought to us exclusively by the Long-Term Good-News Channel.

One more thing that the happyologists’ findings suggest is that absolute income, not relative income, is what matters most for happiness. The Joneses may have more money than us but that does not necessarily make them happier than us. And I must say, as one who can afford simply to spend time hiking in fine weather, in good boots and in good company, I have no argument with that proposition either.