khosq.com

The World Values Survey, the work of a global network of social
scientists, says happiness increased from 1981 to 2007 in 45 of 52
countries.

"Rich is better than poor, but more importantly being free -- being
in a democracy -- as well as gender equality and tolerance of
minorities were the key factors to happiness," study director Ronald
Inglehart of the University of Michigan's Institute for Social
Research, told United Press International. "The most important
determinant of happiness is the extent to which people have free choice
in how to live their lives."

Denmark tops the list of surveyed nations, along with Puerto Rico
and Colombia. A dozen other countries, including Ireland, Switzerland,
the Netherlands, Canada and Sweden also rank above the United States.
Three of the world's poorer countries with long histories of repressive
government -- Moldova, Armenia and Zimbabwe -- are at the bottom of the
list.

The survey, published in the journal Perspectives on Psychological
Science, had a representative sample of about 1,400 in each country and
the margin of error of 3 percentage points to 5 percentage points.