64% of Britons are satisfied with life.
The BBC has been pushing Labour’s ‘cost of living crisis’ hard recently (Ed Miliband: Only Labour can secure ‘recovery for all’) but seems not to want to make much of this:
Britons happier than before financial crisis as contentment plummets in Europe – OECD
OECD says quality of life in the UK has been only “modestly affected” by the global financial crisis with happiness and even trust in government rising – in marked contrast with its neighbours in the Eurozone
Although the recession sent unemployment rising and put a squeeze on living standards in Britain as elsewhere, the drop in national morale seen in other countries is simply “not visible” in the UK, according to the OECD.
Overall Britain was ranked with Switzerland, Australia, Scandanavia, Canada and New Zealand in the top tier of the OECD’s “How’s Life” study which assesses quality of life across 34 leading countries.
It found that British people enjoy some of the strongest friendship networks and highest levels of income, job security, clean air and water, personal safety and democratic accountability in the OECD.
“In the OECD as a whole, the poor employment situation had a major impact on life satisfaction.
“This trend is not visible in the United Kingdom where, from 2007 to 2012, the percentage of British people declaring being very satisfied with their lives increased from 63 per cent to 64 per cent.”
The BBC’s response to the OECD’s report was very muted compared to its extensive and one sided coverage of immigration statistics.
Financial crisis hits happiness levels
Countries worst hit by the global financial crisis saw their happiness levels fall as a result, a survey has suggested.
According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), levels of “life satisfaction” fell sharply between 2007 and 2012 in countries like Greece and Spain.
Trust in governments also deteriorated over that time.
The OECD said the findings showed the far-reaching impact of the crisis.
However, the UK saw its happiness levels rise 1% between 2007 and 2012, putting it in the 20% of happiest countries in the OECD, alongside the likes of Australia, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and New Zealand.
The UK also bucked the trend by showing a rise in trust in the government, up from 36% to 47% between 2007 and 2011.
“The global economic crisis has had a profound impact on people’s well-being, reaching far beyond the loss of jobs and income, and affecting citizens’ satisfaction with their lives and their trust in governments,” the 34-member organisation said.
Note how it emphasizes the bad news and only then slipped in the ‘but Britain is doing better‘……and note that sly ‘the UK saw its happiness levels rise 1% between 2007 and 2012‘.
Satisfaction risen…but by a mere 1%…nothing to cheer about eh? Let’s downplay the truth.
Why not report what was actually said?:
‘The percentage of British people declaring being very satisfied with their lives increased from 63 per cent to 64 per cent.’
Which tells us that a good majority think their lives aren’t so bad as Labour tell us, via the BBC.
One of the ironic side-effects of austerity is the realisation that materialism and money alone do not make for a happy life. Miliband needs to take this on board when he goes on and on about the cost of living and the living wage. Labour’s answer to social problems is always to throw more and more money at them. In Labour’s eyes there’s never enough money!
The poorest in society will always be the poorest. Not because they don’t have enough money but because they have the least money. Even if you pay them the ‘living wage’ they will still have the least amount of money and will still be the poorest.
We need to measure how poor a person is by how unhappy they are rather than by how little money they have. I’m sure there are thousands of well-off people in this country who are desperately unhappy for various reasons. They need help as much as those who are struggling with money.
Well said. It is encouraging that many people have learned (albeit the hard way!) that you don’t actually NEED the latest phone, the biggest TV, the designer gear etc. Since the 90s most have indebted themselves on easy money for the one simple reason that they could, shopping is great, yippee…until you have to start paying it back. Then they realise that clearing the debt is also a great feeling and end up being more secure, more mature, more content with less etc.
The bit I do not understand is that Miliband constantly waffle son about the cost of living. He talks about utilities, the price of food but he never acknowledges where the real costs come from: taxation.
When we lose 65% of our income in tax, there is no point in working. Why is the BBC not regularly presenting this simple truth? That life is expensive because of excessive taxes?
The BBC live off tax and so low tax is always bad and high tax is always good. Being forced to give to the BBC is social justice whereas trying to earn enough to pay your own bills is selfishness.
“…In Labour’s eyes there’s never enough of other people’s money!”
New Labour had a concerted policy of public spending to bolster their voter base = jobs for votes, which is why the state sector swelled so obscenely under the Blair/Brown maladministration. Of course, in the end, when the financial bubble burst Brown’s house of cards came falling down only too easily, built as it was on a very shaky foundation.
None of this will stop Labour from attempting to do exactly the same thing again, next time around, should they get into power. All of the good work the Coalition has made in tackling our debts will be undone in an instant by a spendthrift Labour government determined to fatten the state once again with hundreds and thousands of non-jobs to power it’s love of centralised bureaucracy and to infect local government up and down the country with its noxious political values.
In some areas of G.B. there might well be an argument for a *living wage* as opposed to the minimum wage. But what has not been talked about is the massive rise in inflation should the *living wage* be implemented across the board. Our overseas competitors will be rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of our sky high production costs as their bank accounts get bigger whilst our unemployment figures get bigger. I have not yet heard anyone at the BBC talk of the inflation rate consequence, which is the biggest problem for the low paid workers of G.B. who will be hit hardest of all.
Let me get this straight. You currently pay some of your employees £6.31 per hour. Mr Milliband wants you to pay them £7.45 per hour (£8.55 per hour in London). If they work a 40 hour week, and get paid for 52 weeks per year, then your increased cost per employee for one year is at least £2,371 (£4,660 in London) if my calculations are correct), and almost double the lower figure for employees below the age of 21.
In return, for one year only, you will get a rebate of up to £1,000 per employee moving to this wage.
So, in the one year you will get a rebate, your business costs are going to increase by around £1,400 per (full-time-equivalent) employee now moved to a ‘living wage’ (then all the other collateral increases have to be factored in), and thereafter, your costs will increase by at least £2,400 or so, per year, per full-time-equivalent employee. And, if you think that those who are already paid just a bit more more than this ‘living wage’ are going to allow their ‘pay differential’ to be eroded by such a move, then I have a bridge or two you might be interested in buying !
Now, who do you think is going to pay for all this ? And don’t even think that we’re really going to recoup all these benefits which will somehow, mysteriously, not be claimed by people on these wages….and, of course, which will NOT be used to help out businesses faced with all these increased costs…
Labour mantra – “keep spending other peoples’ money, they haven’t quite run out yet….. and boy, will this gather us some more votes from those too stupid to work things out – and to hell with the country and its longer-term survival”.
We really should have learned by now from the 13-year charge to Armageddon which was the last Labour Government’s gift to the UK. Not that the BBC appears to to be in any hurry to scrutinise any actual figures in this debate, in any way, manner or form.
Pretty much spot on there Richard D. What hasn’t been talked about either is what happens to those who are on a *living wage* or above it? It is they that will pay for the *living wage* to be implemented and of course it is nothing more than a redistribution of wealth, but at huge cost to those who can least afford it, the *working class*.
They always make me laugh with this. I recall a tale someone told me about the minimum wage. He was working in company that valeted cars for lots of local dealerships.
When the minimum wage came in, to keep the business viable for the owner and meet the new obligation to the staff, the costs had to increase.
As a result, the dealers had to make an adjustment, which meant less cars or reduced requirements. This situation led to someone being laid off because there just wasn’t the work to justify the numbers any further.
Sad all around and I’m not advocating exploiting workers, but there are consequences to their simplistic thinking.
There will be another massive rise in happiness levels once the doors at Al Beeb mosque are shut for good.
I’m gonna buck the trend here. I certainly don’t feel more satisfied with life as it’s getting to be more of a struggle year on year and the future doesn’t look that bright to me. Secondly I take polls like this with a pinch of salt as they are daft. You end up with silly headlines like ‘Britain passes happiness test’ (not an actual headline just an example )
You’re probably one of the 36%.
I generally think perception tests are unhelpful. People often feel things could be better.
I love this story –
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24815800
Growth in the service sector is at it’s highest level since May 1997. Mmm, what happened around then? Can’t quite put my finger on it.
Then they drop the metaphorical turd at the end of the article with ‘But total economic output for the UK is still less than its 2008 peak.’. That’ll be the 2008 peak just before Labour’s lending bubble burst in a big way.
When have the left ever thought about the consequences of their actions? I am sick of seeing Miliband anywhere spouting his lies about being a “man of the people” when he is claiming his energy bills on expenses and was part of the government responsible for the mess we are currently in
Miliband is using a New Labour trick (despite pretending to distance himself from Blair/Brown) – instead of using hard facts he resorts to “Perception” polls to justify his half-baked policies. The BBC merrily obliges to raise such issues to headline level.