World Happiness Report 2025

The World Happiness Report for 2025 focused on the 'impact of caring and sharing on people’s happiness. Like ‘mercy’ in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, caring is “twice-blessed” – it blesses those who give and those who receive'. The report 'investigates both of these effects: the benefits to the recipients of caring behaviour and the benefits to those who care for others'.  

Respondents to the survey were asked the question "in the last month, they gave money to charity, if they volunteered, and if they helped a stranger. They were also asked, in 2019, if they think other people would help them by returning their lost wallet".  

Key Findings 

People are much too pessimistic about the benevolence of others. For example, when wallets were dropped in the street by researchers, the proportion of returned wallets was far higher than people expected. This is hugely encouraging. 

Our wellbeing depends on our perceptions of others’ benevolence, as well as their actual benevolence. Since we underestimate the kindness of others, our wellbeing can be improved by receiving information about their true benevolence. 

When society is more benevolent, the people who benefit most are those who are least happy. As a result, happiness is more equally distributed in countries with higher levels of expected benevolence. 

Benevolence increased during COVID-19 in every region of the world. People needed more help and others responded. This ‘benevolence bump’ has been sustained since then. Despite a fall from 2023 to 2024, benevolent acts are still about 10% above their pre-pandemic levels. 

The report also focused on how sharing meals supports happiness and social connections, how household size and family bonds relate to happiness, how social connections improve the happiness of young adults, how prosocial behaviour reduces deaths of despair, how unhappiness and social distrust explain populism and giving to others - how to convert your money into greater happiness for others. 

Where does Ireland rank?

Ireland ranks 15th out of 147 countries surveyed. 

Loneliness

The report notes that 'social isolation and loneliness are strongly associated with negative life outcomes. The absence of social ties has been linked to higher rates of disease, shorter life expectancies, lower levels of subjective wellbeing, higher rates of criminality, and greater support for authoritarianism. One widely cited meta-analysis estimated that the negative health consequences of loneliness and isolation were roughly equivalent to smoking 15 cigarettes a day. In short, to paraphrase Dr. Chris Peterson, one of the founding fathers of positive psychology – other people matter.'

Also of note was the increased levels of loneliness were most evident amongst young people. More is known now about the 'role of social networking and messaging apps in social connection and loneliness' with research demonstrating that AI-powered virtual companions (such as chatbots specifically designed for conversational and/or emotional support) may actually offer some short-term relief from feelings of loneliness. Robust research will be essential 'to evaluate their long-term effectiveness and understand how best to integrate them into broader efforts to promote wellbeing'.

The report notes that 'policy-based interventions that address social isolation and loneliness are still sparse, so future progress will require rigorous, evidence-based research to carefully guide policy design and implementation'.

Measures of success

The success or failure of an economy is traditionally measured in terms of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which calculates the value of all goods and services produced by a country or Gross National Product (GNP) which measure how much of that value remains in the country. However, neither of these measures take into account the impact on or the damage that may be caused to people or place in the production of those goods and services. They may also give a false impression of the strength or weakness of an economy. Because of the distorting effect large corporations can have on Ireland’s finances, a new measure was developed, GNI* which seeks to provide a more accurate measurement of what is really happening at the core of the economy. In Ireland also, we have a new measure introduced in Budget 2023, GGB*. Acknowledging the State’s reliance on corporation tax, this metric will be used to monitor the public finances while excluding any ‘excess’ receipts.

But what does any of this mean for the health and happiness of individuals? How do we measure the success or failure of a society? The response to that question that has emerged across the world over the last few decades is to measure the impacts of policy against the wellbeing of citizens. But what exactly does that mean and how is it best done?

So how are we doing? In a country that still is unable to provide secure affordable housing, timely access to healthcare, support children with extra educational needs and has over 629,000 people living in poverty, we have a lot of work to do. Ultimately, as a nation, we want to be well, safe and fulfilled and we want to ensure that so are the generations to come.

Social Justice Ireland's Annual Social Policy Conference in 2022 explored how we can deliver on wellbeing initiatives and make suggestions for new initiatives or propose improvements to existing methods. More Here.