This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, February 22nd, 2008. I'm Caleb Brown.

What Makes the Danes so happy?

60 Minutes suggests that Denmark, reputed to be the happiest place on earth, might be happy because of citizens

diminished expectations and their efficient welfare state.

But is Denmark the exception or the rule. Libertarian happy warrior and Cato Institute policy analyst

Will Wilkinson comments.

What is the value of having cross-nation comparisons of happiness.

Well, it's useful to try to measure things like happiness.

We can measure things like wealth in a fairly accurate sort of way, even that's difficult.

But what people really want to know is how people are doing under different kinds of institutions.

And so it's nice to try to come up with some metrics

that give us some idea about what the quality of life

is in different places. Now now the method of giving people surveys that ask them how happy they are

is fraught with a lot of problems and a lot of

complexities it's not the case that every of problems and a lot of complexities.

It's not the case that everybody in every culture

has the same notion of happiness.

So if you ask them about how happy they are,

they might just be interpreting the word a little bit differently.

And there's some evidence of that.

And also different cultures just have different norms

about how to talk about your emotions and about what emotions you ought to be feeling it

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