I am dubious about a lot of these "happiness" index reports. For example I was looking at the UN one and part of it is GDP per capita. The richer the country is the happier its people (so Switzerland comes out as the happiest country). This is not my experience, some of the happiest people have been poor and some of the most miserable have been well off. Another factor looks at the level of support which includes the welfare system. In the Philippines for example, which would score zilch on the welfare system, there is a great deal of family and community support which is not measurable. Happiness can not be reduced to number crunching.