OECD Better Life Index

The OECD has published its Better Life Index that looks at a number of different aspects of all OECD countries like jobs, housing, income, education, and environment. Respondents are asked to rank these categories in terms of their importance to them. For instance, looking at the education category, the top three countries are Sweden, Japan, and Finland. The United States was more in the middle of the pack. For the environment the top three countries were Iceland, the United Kingdom, and Sweden. Again, the United States was found in the middle of the pack. Although these numbers are somewhat arbitrary the index can shed some light on how people from various countries value different things, allowing us to possibly draw some conclusions between answers in various categories and how well that country's economy is preforming.