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An index where Pakistan does well!
HPI ranks Pakistan 16th among 151 countries, score derived from life length, satisfaction, environmental use levels.
The writer is a political economist at the University of California, Berkeley
For Pakistanis disheartened by global indicators where Pakistan fares poorly (e.g., the Legatum Prosperity Index), there is some good news. There is an index where Pakistan excels. Developed by the New Economics Foundation, a UK-based alternative economics think tank, it is called the Happy Planet Index (HPI). The index measures the extent to which countries deliver long, happy and environmentally sustainable lives for their citizens. It is based on the realisation that the widely-used gross domestic product (GDP) per capita indicator only measures how much people in a country produce or consume. The GDP ignores the ultimate bottom line of how happy people are with their lives and how much irreplaceable environmental resources they use in attaining that level of happiness.
With a view to overcoming these omissions, the HPI first considers the average length of life that people enjoy in a country based on United Nations Development Programme information. Second, it considers the life satisfaction levels reported by people in different countries in the Gallup World Poll. Finally, it considers the intensity of scarce environmental resources use for countries by using the ecological footprint index promoted by the World Wildlife Foundation. The HPI is then calculated by multiplying life length levels by life satisfaction levels and dividing it by the ecological footprint score. The HPI is thus a benefit-cost measure — happiness in life times the length of life (benefit) divided by the environmental resources used (cost) generated in deriving that quality of life.
The index reflects the growing realisation that there is first the group of poor countries where economic development is so low that the quality of life is abysmal for the majority of citizens. Secondly, there are the rich countries where the GDPs per capita are very high but reported life satisfaction is not increasing in pace, e.g., while American per capita income has quadrupled since 1945, reported life satisfaction has remained flat. The fast pace of life in many developed countries is leading to high stress, obesity, alienation and other social problems. At the same time, their environmental resources use per capita is so high that it threatens the whole globe. Finally, there are many middle-income countries, which neither suffer from the abject poverty prevalent in poor countries, nor exhibit the high levels of social or environmental problems prevalent in rich countries.
This suggests that, perhaps, the goal for countries should not be endless economic growth but an optimal level, which eradicates abject poverty without producing high levels of social and environmental problems (similarly, the goal for individuals could be an optimal level of wealth). Unsurprisingly, 18 of the top 20 HPI countries are middle-income, including Pakistan, which graduated to the World Bank’s middle-income ranks last year (partially due to double-digit inflation, which has boosted per capita GDP artificially). Nine of the top 10 HPI countries are located in Latin America and the Caribbean. The very rich and very poor countries understandably do not do so well on the index. Even the countries doing well do not necessarily score high on all dimensions.
The HPI ranks Pakistan 16th from the top among 151 countries. Pakistan’s high score derives from medium life length and satisfaction and low environmental use levels. Pakistanis can feel happy at Pakistan’s high score on the HPI (hopefully, that will enhance Pakistan’s future rankings even further!). However, it is also important to note simultaneously that this measure does not erase Pakistan’s low scores on many other social and economic measures. Moreover, the HPI also has its limitations like all other indicators, though one must also resist the temptation to dismiss such indices as completely useless. The HPI is actually stronger than many other similar indices. The best thing would be to use the performance on this measure as a motivation for improving Pakistan’s performance on the many other social and economic spheres where it lags behind. More importantly, the HPI highlights the fact that the real goals of human progress are linked to life satisfaction rather than wealth beyond a certain level of wealth.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 18th, 2012.
Reader Comments (37)
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I dont think so. I think the survey considered UK based Pakistanis as a basic sample pool or was too afraid to get samples from other than Defense, Clifton, Model Towns and Bahria Towns in Pakistan. Yes they are all happy and In my view There are two types of Pakistan within Pakistan in parallel. A Happy and RIch Pakistan and on the other hand we have a Non Happy and Poor Pakistan.
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Ignorance is bliss.
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I always think that media is brewing a Tsunami in a tea cup
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So everything is great and no problems in Pakistan. All the news of living in darkness, without education, without healthcare and lack of food is false. Great to know the “facts” from a Pakistani living in the US. Leave it to some to find ways to prove our superiority.
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@C. Nandkishore:
This may be a wayward study, but it’s safe to say that had Hindustan scored higher than Pakistan, you guys would probably be making a Bollywood film about it by now.
Interesting article.
Hasan
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“low environmental levels”
Example…more load shedding and lower electrical use will result in happier Pakistanis.
On the other hand, Pakistani’s do seem to have that same mix of emotions evident in, for example, those in the American upper mid-west who take pride in their ability to live through the harsh winters while complaining about them.
Perhaps it is all in the ability to appreciate the little things.
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@Hasan:
right and pakistanis would watch it on illegal vcds as the government wont let it release there.
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Pakistan is a middle income country only if you accept that blue is green, and day is night!
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Oh thats very good. Since everybody is happy, there is no need to change the current political dispensation or no need for any ‘sunami’.
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@Mirza: seems like you have not read the article prperly. it does mention that there are numerous indicators where pakistan is lagging and there is need to address them. so pls read properly before commenting. one is hearing about the negatives all the time ; no harm is getting good news too! but it seems , some people only want to hear the bad news about pakistan
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@LionOfPunjab: strange that you dont want the so many obvious things that need fixing!
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We need more load shedding so can will not emit green house gases. Next year we will be number five.
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If there is an HOSPITABLE INDEX, Pakistan will rank one because Pakistanis are most hospitable in the world. This trait transforms to happiness, I agree with the findings. Majority of the world population wants to live a happy life. Hats off to Pakistan. ( No pun intended )
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HPI? What about HDI (Human Development Index), developed by Pakistani Mahbub ul Haq, followed by Indian economist Amartya Sen. Where our country ranks 145th. It seems HPI does not tell how “happy” the people are per se… but seems more of an environmental sustainability index coupled with the individuals’ own perception of satisfaction. e.g. nowadays a person having 6 hrs load-shedding in city, regularly scheduled will be much more ‘satisfied’ then compared to someone who only gets 6 hrs of electricity in infrequent unequal intervals. Does not necessarily mean the former is living a “happy life”.
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those who have visited Europe and US, can say very easily that those people are a depressed and sad bunch of people in general.. their life revolves around money and materialistic gains…
Comparatively despite compounded hardships Pakistanis are very happy people.. they are happy despite the dire economic and security situation in their country..
This is a greatness of this nation, but it does not mean that the condition of the people here is improving or anything like that..
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This is good news, indeed! If we could learn to be tolerant and improve our literacy rate, I am sure we will climb to #5 or higher.
And could we please stop ET comments between Indian and Pakistani commentators from degenerating into mudslinging contests. If we want to climb to #5 or higher, we will have to exhibit more tolerance.
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Many ex-pats and foreigners are rushing to Pakistani embassies abroad after this research publication. There is a mob like situation at all Pakistani visa centers. Thanks for spreading the good news!
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Hard to believe that Pakistan is full of happy people. Maybe they polled the Pakistanis who are about to leave Pakistan to go to some some peaceful country. They must be feeling happy because they are leaving? Did they poll people at the airport?
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If one is ignorant or is kept ignorant of his plight and he looks or feels happy out of ignorance or helplessness he can not be called to be living a satisfactory life.This HPI thing has caused to pour insult over injury to the hapless Pakistanis.If author of this article really thinks that Pakistan ranks 16th in prosperity according to HPI then what is he doing sitting in a poor country like America.He should come here and enjoy life
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@Awans: you are wrong. People are not as dissatisfied as you think.Apart from power shortag and inflation, there is no wrong here in Pakistan.
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High quality poppy seeds does wonders for Happiness. Delusional but happy
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You better hope tat nobody in the University of California where you work, reads this abolutely idiotic article. Perhaps you should return to Pakistan where people are ‘more satisied’ than we are in USA
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@FactCheck:
Do you have a problem with that?
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Pakistan’s high score derives from medium life length and satisfaction and low environmental use levels.
i.e., die young, die happy: and this is not surprising that Pakistan has low environmental use levels. With declining economy and poor state of infrastructure, I wont be surprised that Pakistan is even ranking higher in the (low usage of) CO2/emissions statistics as there is declining production of almost everything.
HPI also has its limitations like all other indicators, obviously. There are ways to measure happiness and contentment than simply asking a question or two on happiness, e.g., how may hours a week on average people work to sustain their lifestyles or living, what is the minimum wage and how it corresponds to inflation and cost of living (and for the latter, what are the basic life essentials in that country and what are their prices), what is the average or median disposable income, how much time off work people take on average and finally statistics on healthcare. You can hardly consider a person in poor health to be happy.
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@Ahmed
I was being sarcastic! We need lot of changes but unfortunately we dont have any messiah coming from the current lot, both civilians and army. cheers!
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@author::If indices are to be the measure of how Pakistan is doing then let us hold the list of various achievements upside-down.Pakistan will come out to be victorious,with flying colours in all fields.Not that I want to belittle Pakistanism as I am a proud Pakistani myself than most,I write these lines because my heart bleeds when I see some individuals boasting and finding baseless excuses to claim false grandeurRecommend
This article has done one good thing by dividing the Optimists and Pessimists….I, being an eternal optimist, love the findings….I always knew deep down that we were happy, no matter what the circumstances….Hats Off to all the optimists…
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Whoa people. take a step back. The author is marely describing the facts from the index.
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Swiss accounts hawala banks where india pakistan does well in the index…
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The link the author has provided http://www.happyplanetindex.org/ is not even accessible, i don’t know how ET allowed such an editorial to be published…
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@Pollack:
I beg to differ with your comments. I wish if you could understand either Urdu or Punjabi. Pakistani stage plays are full of life and happiness. I have been living in the West with a very high stress job. The only panacea for my job is the stage shows produced by very talented Pakistani actors and producers.
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@Anonymous: i also could not access the website; some problem there. but if you just google for it, you will find the wikipedia enrty which describes the index
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@KT: its not a matter of die young die die happy. the measure includes life expectancy; so you cannot have a high rank with die young. Do you have a background in surveys; do you think you know to do them better than gallup? seem like all off the cuff remarks rather than serious analysis
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@Chimera: i dont think you know berkeley; i have studies there; this is the type of forward and progressive research people do there; you are just advertsing your own ignorance with such comments
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@Rashid, I dont pay much attention to these polls as they try to extract objectivity out of very subjective information that they sample from “representative” population, which is very easy to doctor. There is a wealth of objective data (available from most of the population rather than just a sample) that I have mentioned in my comments that will openly negate this poll. Please tell me, how can you claim that Pakistanis are happier when increasing numbers sleep at night hungry. So these were not off-the-cuff remarks as I have been a data analyst and know how polls work and how can they be made to work for a specific purpose or a bias. In this case the bias may not have been to show Pakistanis being happier, it may just be a side-effect.
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@KT: at least you are basing your arguments on some logic rather than the other comments here. however, there are several issues here–you mention objective data; hwoever, happiness is ultimately a subjective emotion and what makes people happy or unhappy varies; some people are able to be happy with even little; some people not even with a lot; secondly, the lie satisfaction level in this index for pakistan is shown as medium range; not high; so the index is not saying that everyone in pakistan is satisfied or highly satisfied; just that the combination of the three sub-dimesnions places pakistan at no. 16. moreover, you cannot say the fraamers of this index of bias becuae they have not done the surveys; they have taken informaation from three other sources; all of which are well reputed. if you have doubts about the gallup poll methodloggies, the rational thing would be to get more details from them about this survey and then point out the mistake sin it rather than just assuming that it must be wrong; so yes, that part of your statment is off-the-cuff
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@KT: in addition, you say there is information available for the population rather than samples; that is actually not true; there is no recent population information available for pakistan since it did its last census in 1998. everything more recent is based on sample surveys, which too will have their limitations like the gallup samples, or it is based on something even weaker–subjective opinions
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