European Union Court of First Instance finds EU Senior Position Job Vacancy Adverts are Discriminatory if Published Only in English, French and German

The translators in Europe will be happy about a decision of the Court of First Instance of the European Union, just handed down in case in which the suit was brought by Italy, as joined by Spain and Latvia.

The court decision nullified a European Commission policy, adopted in the year 2004, to publish job vacancy notices for senior positions in English, French and German languages only. The court held that such a selective language policy is discriminatory.

Read the details at EU Law Blog.

Europeana Crashes on Launch Day to Return in December in a Better More Improved Version

Not everything is as easy as it looks. On November 20, 2008 the European Union Digital Libraries Initiative launched Europeana, a multimillion-euro digital library intended as a friendly and cooperative European competitor to things like Google Book Search.

As written by Leigh Phillips at EUobserver, here is the idea:

"Websurfers can access some 2 million books, maps, recordings, photographs, archival documents, paintings and films from national libraries and cultural institutions of the EU's 27 member states.

"Europeana is much more than a library, it is a veritable dynamo to inspire 21st century Europeans to emulate the creativity of innovative forbears like the drivers of the Renaissance," said commission president Jose Manuel Barroso at the launch."

But the launch hit a serious snag, again as Leigh Phillips writes at EUobserver:

"Going live on Thursday (20 November), the site was instantly overwhelmed by the 10 million visitors per hour it was receiving and crashed mid-morning, requiring a quick doubling of the number of servers supporting the library. It crashed again in the early evening."

When one now goes to the Europeana website, one is greeted with the following message - our scan of the current page there:
(CLICK HERE FOR THAT SUBSEQUENT LINK TO FURTHER INFORMATION)
__________


__________

Rome was not built in a day.

Update:
The New York Times Stephen Castle reports in
Europeana Goes Online and Is Then Overwhelmed

EQLS : The Second European Quality of Life Survey – First Findings viz. Deuxième enquête européenne sur la qualité de vie - Premiers résultats

Via EUobserver.com we have learned of the 2nd EQLS (European Quality of Life Survey) by Eurofound (European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions).

The EQLS Survey will be published in full only in the year 2009, but as of November 18, 2008 we do now already have the first results of that survey in an English-language .pdf and a French-language .pdf, respectively titled Second European Quality of Life Survey – First Findings viz. Deuxième enquête européenne sur la qualité de vie - Premiers résultats.

The results confirm the sentiment of the Bob Hope cinema film of the year 1965 whose title I'll take Sweden might just as well represent the primarily Nordic winners of this Eurofound survey, as the Nordic nations dominate in "happiness", as shown by the following graphics from the EQLS First Results:

EQLS Second European Quality Of Life Survey - First Results - Figures 1 and 2

The Life Satisfaction and Happiness Index for the European Union Member States and Candidate Countries gives the following rankings, from most happy and satisfied to least happy and least satisfied:

1. Denmark
2. Sweden
3. Finland
4. Norway
5. Netherlands
6. Luxembourg
7. Ireland
8. Malta
9. Belgium
10. United Kingdom
11. France
12. Spain
13. Germany
14. Cyprus
15. Poland
16. Austria
17. Slovakia
18. Estonia
19. Czech Republic
20. Greece
21. Italy
22. Romania
23. Croatia
24. Lithuania
25. Portugal
26. Turkey
27. Latvia
28. Hungary
29. FYR Macedonia
30. Bulgaria

The First Findings of the Survey cover:

Life Satisfaction
- General parameters
- Optimism
- Subjective well-being

Income and Deprivation
- Household essentials and deprivation
- Dealing with lack of income

Family

Work-life balance

Health and health care
- Mental health
- Health care services

Housing, environment and quality of society
- Quality of housing
- Local environment

Quality of society
- Trust in other people and Institutions
- Tension between societal groups

Methodology"

For further information we refer to the contact data found at the end of the First Findings publication:

Teresa Renehan, Information Liaison Officer:
ter@eurofound.europa.eu
European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working
Conditions
Wyattville Road, Loughlinstown, Dublin 18, Ireland
Telephone: (+353 1) 204 31 00
Email: postmaster@eurofound.europa.eu
Website: http://www.eurofound.europa.eu

Crossposted to LawPundit.

What Do Europeans Care About? Google Searches as Measured in the Individual Member Countries by the EU Observer Monthly Top 10

EU Observer has a new feature by which they produce a monthly EU Observer list via Google Zeitgeist of the Top 10 percentage spikes in Google searches in the EU, which, as the EU Observer writes, "allows small countries such as Finland and Austria to figure in the results, if an event prompted a sudden surge in interest."

The top ten so weighted searches in October, 2008 in the EU were:

October

1. HALLOWEEN: American style "trick or treating" swept Europe on 31 October.
2. VAALIKONE: Finns searched election website in municipal elections on 26 October.
3. ICESAVE: UK subsidiary of Iceland's Landisbanki declared bankruptcy.
4. SUPRENALOTTO: Italy's lottery site swept when Sicilian suburb won €100 million.
5. KENZA FARAH: The French R&B singer was hurt in a car accident on 13 October.
6. FALLOUT 3: This nuclear simulation game was launched on 16 October.
7. PES 2009: The Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 video game was released.
8. X FACTOR: The UK's hit reality show drew record audiences in October.
9. AC DC: The Australian band released its new album Black Ice on 20 October.
10. MAM TALENT: The Polish version of the television show "I Have Talent!".
    

Take a look. There IS a big world out there, beyond our own neighborhoods. Stay informed.

Crossposted to LawPundit.

Paris Summit Approves the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) as composed of EU Member States and Mediterranean States

Here is an interesting geopolitical question. What country in Africa, NOT located on the Mediterranean, is a part of the just approved Union for the Mediterranean (UfM)? See UfM map. This country is geographically larger than either France, Germany or Spain, more than twice as large geographically as Iraq, nearly six times the geographic size of Syria, and also larger geographically than either Egypt or Turkey. The answer is: Mauritania. (See world map).

On July 13, 2008 Barcelona Process : Union for the Mediterranean (Union pour la Méditerranée) was approved at the Paris Summit of the leaders of the member countries. The organization, though in somewhat different form, was originally the brainchild of French President Nicolas Sarkozy "who said its aim was to ensure the region's people could love each other instead of making war."

The Union for the Mediterranean is a 43-member community, encompassing 750 million people (ca. 25% from Arab States), and comprised of the Member States of the European Union plus the "states" bordering on the Mediterranean Sea and participating in the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership (the so-called "Barcelona Process").

The goal of the Union for the Mediterranean is to improve relations between the EU, North Africa and the Middle East and to tackle common problems such as immigration, pollution and political unrest.

But already one day after approval of the Union there are signs that the leadership of the non-EU countries will have to struggle to muster up the maturity and the discipline needed to carry out such an ambitious project, which has been cautiously supported by the USA in the hopes of "spurring on Palestinian-Israeli peace negotiations."

There is also negative opinion that the Union for the Mediterranean could serve to accelerate general devolution in the European Union.

Nevertheless, in spite of the obvious political problems involved, main areas of focus of the Union for the Mediterranean will be:

• improving energy supply
• fighting pollution in the Mediterranean
• strengthening the surveillance of maritime traffic and "civil security cooperation"
• setting up a Mediterranean Erasmus exchange programme for students, and
• creating a scientific community between Europe and its southern neighbours.

For an interactive map (in French) relating to details about the UfM (Union for the Mediterranean), see Making Mediterranean waves at the blog of MESH, Middle East Strategy at Harvard, a project of the John M. Olin Institute for Strategic Studies at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs.

Crossposted from LawPundit.

EDRI Protects Privacy and Digital Civil Rights in Europe

European Digital Rights (EDRI) is an organization in Europe which defends civil rights in the "information society" in Europe. As written at their website:

"European Digital Rights was founded in June 2002. Currently 28 privacy and civil rights organisations have EDRI membership. They are based or have offices in 17 different countries in Europe....

Statutory membership is restricted to not-for-profit, non-governmental organisations whose goals include the defence and promotion of civil rights in the field of information- and communication technology."

EDRI produces EDRI-gram, a bi-weekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe.

Subscribe here to EDRI-gram.

New Urgent Preliminary Ruling Procedure is Applicable in the European Union (EU) Starting March 1, 2008

The Court of Justice of the European Communities, the Curia in Luxembourg, has issued a press release in which it outlines the completely new Urgent Preliminary Ruling Procedure which started application on March 1, 2008 as a European Union procedure in the area of freedom, security and justice:

"The Treaty of Amsterdam on the European Union (EU) which came into force on 1 May 1999 states that the EU:

• must be maintained and developed as an area of freedom, security and justice;
• (an area) in which the free movement of persons is assured;
• in conjunction with appropriate measures with respect to external border controls, asylum, immigration and the prevention and combating of crime."

This area now covers:

• Free movement of persons
• Visa policy
• EU external borders policy
• Schengen area
• Immigration
• Asylum
• Judicial cooperation in civil and criminal matters
• Drugs policy coordination
• EU citizenship
• Data protection
• Fundamental rights
• Racism and xenophobia
• Police and customs cooperation
• Crime prevention
• Fight against organised crime
• External relations
• Enlargement from a justice and home affairs perspective

Since the normal preliminary ruling procedure on such cases takes on average a year and a half, the Court of Justice, at the urging of the Council, proposed the adoption of the Urgent Preliminary Ruling Procedure in order to expedite urgent cases. As the Court of Justice writes:

"This procedure is applicable as from 1 March 2008 and should enable the Court to deal far more quickly with the most sensitive issues relating to the area of freedom, security and justice, such as those which may arise, for example, in certain situations where a person is deprived of his liberty and the answer to the question raised is decisive as to the assessment of the legal situation of the person detained or deprived of his liberty, or, in proceedings concerning parental authority or custody of children, where the jurisdiction under Community law of the court hearing the case depends on the answer to the question referred for a preliminary ruling."

Hat tip to EU Law Blog, where there is more discussion of this development in detail, including a supplemental information note.

Main European Union Law Websites

The website of the Delegation of the European Commission to the USA has a page of law links which it calls ESSENTIAL EUROPEAN UNION LAW WEBSITES in the title and additionally in the page heading also labels Best European Union Law Websites and Principal European Union Law Websites.

The links are divided into two major categories:

1. GATEWAY AND MAJOR INSTITUTIONAL WEBSITES
- in the United States
- in Europe

2. ATABASE WEBSITES VIA EUROPA at
http://europa.eu/geninfo/info/guide/index_en.htm#db

GDP Growth in the EU : Latvia Leads the European Union (EU) in the Dynamics of Economies of the Member States

The blog EU for US links to a CBS (.nl) graph showing GDP growth in the European Union Member States since 2005. These growth statistics say a lot about the future of Europe and indicate clearly that the older economies of the EU are being surpassed in dynamics by the rapidly expanding economies of the newer European Union countries.

We have converted that graph to a list showing the relative rank of the EU countries by GDP growth and have appended the approximate growth rate:

1. Latvia (ca. 12% growth)
2. Estonia (over 11%)
3. Slovakia (over 8%)
4. Romania (nearly 8%)
5. Lithuania (over 6%)
6. Luxembourg (just over 6%)
7. Bulgaria (about 6%)
8. Czech Republik (about 6%)
9. Ireland (about 6%)
10. Poland (between 5% and 6%)
11. Finland (between 5% and 6%)
12. Slovenia (between 5% and 6%)
13. Greece (between 4% and 5%)
14. Sweden (just over 4%)
15. Hungary (about 4%)
16. Spain (about 4%)
17. Cyprus (about 4%)
18. Belgium (about 3%)
19. Denmark (about 3%)
20. Austria (about 3%)
21. Netherlands (about 3%)
22. Malta (about 3%)
23. Germany (just under 3%)
24. United Kingdom (just under 3%)
25. France (about 2%)
26. Italy (about 2%)
27. Portugal (over 1%)

Epiphany in Europe : The Star Singers (Sternsinger) in Germany, Austria and Switzerland

The Sternsinger (star singers) dressed as the three Biblical Magi (kings, wise men) were just at our door this afternoon on a bright sunny Sunday here in Germany and we thus thought that we would tell you something about them, because they represent a seldom seen side of the low-key but still fundamentally deep strength of Christian tradition in Europe.

More than 500000 children are underway as "star singers" (Sternsinger) at this time of year (predominantly today, January 6, Epiphany) in the German-speaking nations of Europe, i.e. not only (but predominantly) in Germany, as also in Austria and Switzerland.

Epiphany as a Christian religious feast most certainly first marked the nativity or baptism of Christ, although the tradition may go back to even more ancient astronomical celebrations.

The star singers are sponsored by the local Catholic churches and this year in Germany are underway under the motto "Sternsinger für die Eine Welt" (star singers for one world).

The star singers ring doorbells at households all across the land (primarily in Catholic areas), and when those doors are opened - it is considered bad luck to send the star singers away without opening doors for them - the star singers then sing songs of faith at those doorsteps in order by collection to raise money for needy children around the world. Below are some photos of the star singers:


A 2004 AP photo from Deutsche Welle


A photo of star singers in 2007 at the doorstep of the Parliament
of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most populous State
A blessing is written in chalk by the star singers on the front door of the household, marking the current year, together with the initials of the three Biblical kings (or wise men):

20*C+M+B*08

See the blessing to the left, wirtten in chalk on a door this year 2008.

It is also possible in the course of development of this custom that the initials CMB - always in that order - either initially or subsequently meant Christus mansionem benedicat, which translates generally as "may Christ bless this house".

Europe's Shared Values are the Values of the West : Heinrich August Winkler in Die Welt : European Union Urgently Needs to Develop a "We-Feeling"

Surely one of the most perspicacious analysts of the European Union is Heinrich August Winkler (German bio, English bio), until March 2007 Professor of Contemporary History at the Humboldt University of Berlin, who has a superb article in the December 27, 2007 issue of Die Welt (online in German).

As written about Professor Winkler by the German Historical Institute:

"Prof. Winkler has been a Kennedy Memorial Fellow at Harvard University; a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington, D.C., and a fellow of Berlin’s Institute for Advanced Study (Wissenschaftskolleg)."

Winkler is also the author of:

Auf ewig in Hitlers Schatten? Über die Deutschen und ihre Geschichte (Forever In Hitler’s Shadow? Concerning the Germans and Their History, a seminal work unfortunately available only in German);
and,
Germany: The Long Road West (in English by Oxford University Press, 2006) in which author Winkler:

"follows the West’s long path to the division of power, the inalienable rights of humankind, and pluralistic democracy. At the end is a plea to the listener to understand the political culture of the West as “Streitkultur,” as a culture of conflict. Transatlantic controversies about political conclusions, a result of western values, are necessary again and again. It’s really a matter of the interpretation of values that both sides understand as obligatory."

In his "Die Welt" article, which we translate as The Values of Europe are the Values of the West: Why the European Union Urgently Needs to Develop a "We-Feeling", Winkler identifies some of the cardinal problems facing the EU and of Europe generally.

• Among these problems, and above all is the current lack of a feeling of togetherness in Europe, the lack of a "we-feeling", which is fundamentally necessary for what Winkler calls "Project Europe" to succeed in the long term.

• Moreover, this lack of a "we-feeling" is being exacerbated by a - too hasty - territorial expansion of the European Union which is proceeding at a faster pace than a corresponding - and absolutely essential - understanding of that expansion by European citizens, not only from a historical perspective, but also in terms of contemporary events and foreseeable (and unforeseeable) future developments. Winkler urges further necessary consolidation of the EU already formed, before any further expansion takes place, since this would only counteract such a consolidation at the present time (see in this regard euro|topics).

• Winkler also points to the power of the executive in the Europe Union as "taking on a life of its own" as institutions such as the European Commission and the Council of the European Union increasingly dominate EU affairs, to the detriment of the European Parliament and the EU's judicial organs, a phenomenon which Winkler compares to Karl Marx's characterization of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte (later Napoleon III), under whose rule, as written in the Wikipedia:
  
  "New constitutional statutes were passed which officially maintained an elected Parliament and reestablished universal male suffrage. However, the Parliament now became irrelevant as real power was completely concentrated in the hands of Louis-Napoléon and his bureaucracy."
  

It is a direction which the European Union, following the French tradition, also appears in part to be taking under the currently dominant EU executive-based bureaucracy.

Winkler's primary thesis in his Die Welt article is that Europe alone is not "the West", as used in common parlance, but that "the West" transcends Europe and includes not only and especially the transatlantic connection to the United States of America and its modern-era concepts of "representative government", "checks and balances" and "the rule of law", but also extends to lands of the Occident which historically share the West European legal tradition, but who must battle the burden of their periods of previous Byzantine and Osmanic oppression.

Winkler says that the job of "Project Europe" can not be built by the "political class" alone, but that European consolidation can only be achieved if the civil population, the intellectuals, the scientists and the writers/commentators all understand Europe to be their project as well. Indeed, this posting at LawPundit is one small contribution to this effort.

Winkler asks all of those named groups to work to create "a commonly shared European public sphere," which has been identified as follows by publisher Routledge in describing a book edited by John Erik Fossum and Philip R Schlesinger, The European Union and the Public Sphere:

"The European Union is often attacked for its ‘democratic deficit’, namely its deficiencies in representation, transparency and accountability, as well as its lack of popular support. Can these shortcomings be counteracted by the development of a viable European public sphere?

This book assesses the possible formation of a communicative space that might enable and engender the creation of a transnational or a supranational public. The contributors consider the EU’s democratic credentials and how well it communicates, and they also evaluate the major institutions and their links to general publics.

The European Union and the Public Sphere emphasizes a ‘deliberative democratic’ perspective on the public sphere, addressing some key questions:

• What are the prospects for a European public sphere?
• Should we think in terms of the EU having a single public sphere, or are overlapping public spheres a more viable option?
• What do this book’s findings on the question of the public sphere tell us about the EU as a political entity?

Students and scholars of European democracy, political communication, and the politics of institutions will all be greatly interested by this book."

Put into straight language, what Winkler is arguing in his Die Welt article is that it is going to take a massive effort far beyond the EU institutions to get the people of Europe to adopt a "we-feeling" as Europeans, rather than seeing themselves as "nationals" belonging to a loose confederation of largely sovereign States with whom their own State shares some superficial commonalities.

Winkler sees the "shared value system" of "the West" as the primary common ground for the Member States of the European Union. In the last analysis, that is most certainly the glue required to establish a more unified Europe in the long-term. Shared values -- and their effective communication in the European public sphere -- are the key to the future consolidation of Europe. Those shared values also mark the limits of European Union expansion.


Cross-posted to LawPundit.

A Europe of Open Borders as Schengen Zone Expands

Edis Bevan writes at his blog MKNE political information:

"Back in 1945 my mother swam the Elbe to escape the oncoming Soviet army and find refuge in British held territory. Europe was a place of fear.

At midnight today (20 December 2007) the Schengen agreement that allows for free passage –without need of passports- across national frontiers within most of the European Union is extended to include her native Lithuania (and eight other countries including Latvia and Estonia). What an extraordinary contrast in 60-odd years."

As Deutsche Welle and other news sources reported in the second half of December, expanded open borders in Europe in the Schengen Zone have become a reality as nine EU countries became Schengen Zone members on December 21, 2007: Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, joining previous Schengen Zone members Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Greece, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden, so that there are now 24 Schengen Zone members. In addition, Monaco honors the Schengen Agreement but is not a signatory to it.

This expansion moves the controlled Eastern border of Europe to non-Schengen Zonecountries further East, as shown below in a map linked from Telegraph.co.uk (see there for more info), where visas will now become more expensive at the border for the non-EU countries:


When Bulgaria and Romania join the EU and the Schengen Zone, the natural axis of power between East and West will be re-esatablished as the line running at the land bottleneck between the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea. This natural axis of power was recognized as one of the world's most important borders historically by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr., editor, The Dynamics of World Power: A Documentary History of United States Foreign Policy 1945-1973, a five-volume compendium later reprinted in paperback in 10 volumes and available through AbeBooks.

The United Kingdom and Ireland, although they are EU members, are not members of the Schengen Zone, whereas Norway and Iceland are members of the Schengen Zone, but are not members of the EU. The Schengen countries are shown at the following map linked from BBC News Europe:


That results in an interlinked Schengen Zone which looks like the following map, linked from Wikipedia, which has an extensive article on the Schengen Agreement (in the map below, the green areas are Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Bulgaria and Romania, who are not Schengen Zone members yet, but who are scheduled to join in the near future:


Not only EU citizens or travelers from Norway or Iceland but also non-EU travelers can travel freely within the Schengen countries if they obtain a Schengen Visa.

Such a Schengen Visa (issued in various categories) among other thinigs are not required for visitors from North America, Japan, most of South America, Australia, New Zealand. See the European Union visa lists at Wikipedia.

The map below linked from Wikipedia shows the Schengen Visa requirement worldwide:


Dark Blue - EU member states
Light Blue - Special visa-free provisions (Schengen Agreement, OCT or other)
Red - Visa required to enter the EU - annex I countries (negative list)
Green - Visa-free access to the EU for 90 days - annex II countries (positive list)
Grey - Visa-status unknown

Interesting is the unflattering comparison (for North America) of the European Schengen Zone with US-Canada relations (see the comments to that posting).

For some comments about the Schengen expansion, see the blogosphere at:
- Jon Worth's Euroblog - Schengen: it's bad both ways according to the UK media and
Schengen enlargement - let’s start the debate in the UK too and take his EU test at Know the EU the Facebook way
- Colin Ross - Schengen Zone gets bigger (greetinigs to the Midlands)
- Edis Bevan - MKNE political information
- Blog - Richard Corbett MEP - The Tories and Schengen (greetings to Yorkshire)
- Slugger O'Toole - So sign up to Schengen...
- Ordovicius - Schengen Expands (with map)
- Forum Flyer Talk - Issues regarding Issuance of Visas
- CIPE Development Blog - Border-free Europe expands
- No More Passport - Just Pass the Port

HAPPY New Year 2008 from EU Pundit : But What is Happiness Around the Globe? Money, Culture, Social Relationships and the Science of Well-Being

We have posted previously about happiness at our blog LawPundit, including Happiness Is ... Living in the Right Country and it has been the subject of other bloggers, such as The Countess, who writes:

"... the Dalai Lama said, "I believe that the very purpose of our life is to seek happiness. That is clear. Whether one believes in religion or not, whether one believes in this religion or that religion, we are all seeking something better in life. So, I think, the very motion of our life is toward happiness...""

If we are to believe Daniel Kahneman, via Marginal Revolution, Nobel Prize winner in Economics in 2002, writing at Edge, then there is a very strong correlation between happiness and wealth (material prosperity), quite contrary to the old saw that money will not make you happy:

"Humans everywhere, from Norway to Sierra Leone, apparently evaluate their life by a common standard of material prosperity, which changes as GDP increases. The implied conclusion, that citizens of different countries do not adapt to their level of prosperity, flies against everything we thought we knew ten years ago. We have been wrong and now we know it. I suppose this means that there is a science of well-being, even if we are not doing it very well."

Seen on a very broad scale, material prosperity is of course important to happiness. People on the brink of starvation or suffering from serious health problems are not going to be as happy as if they were healthy. This is shown by Adrian White's Satisfaction with Life Index (shown at Wikipedia):

"The concept of happiness, or satisfaction with life, is currently a major area of research in economics and psychology, most closely associated with new developments in positive psychology. It has also become a feature in the current political discourse in the UK."

International Ranking (2006)

Rank	Country	SWL	Rank	Country	SWL
1	Denmark	273.33	90	Japan	206.67
1	Switzerland	273.33	90	Yemen	206.67
3	Austria	260	92	Portugal	203.33
3	Iceland	260	93	Sri Lanka	203.33
5	The Bahamas	256.67	94	Tajikistan	203.33
6	Finland	256.67	95	Vietnam	203.33
7	Sweden	256.67	96	Iran	200
8	Bhutan	253.33	97	Comoros	196.67
9	Brunei	253.33	98	Croatia	196.67
10	Canada	253.33	99	Poland	196.67
11	Ireland	253.33	100	Cape Verde	193.33
12	Luxembourg	253.33	101	Kazakhstan	193.33
13	Costa Rica	250	102	South Korea	193.33
14	Malta	250	103	Madagascar	193.33
15	Netherlands	250	104	Bangladesh	190
16	Antigua and Barbuda	246.67	105	Republic of the Congo	190
17	Malaysia	246.67	106	The Gambia	190
18	New Zealand	246.67	107	Hungary	190
19	Norway	246.67	108	Libya	190
20	Seychelles	246.67	109	South Africa	190
21	Saint Kitts and Nevis	246.67	110	Cambodia	186.67
22	United Arab Emirates	246.67	111	Ecuador	186.67
23	United States	246.67	112	Kenya	186.67
24	Vanuatu	246.67	113	Lebanon	186.67
25	Venezuela	246.67	114	Morocco	186.67
26	Australia	243.33	115	Peru	186.67
27	Barbados	243.33	116	Senegal	186.67
28	Belgium	243.33	117	Bolivia	183.33
29	Dominica	243.33	118	Haiti	183.33
30	Oman	243.33	119	Nepal	183.33
31	Saudi Arabia	243.33	120	Nigeria	183.33
32	Suriname	243.33	121	Tanzania	183.33
33	Bahrain	240	122	Benin	180
34	Colombia	240	123	Botswana	180
35	Germany	240	124	Guinea-Bissau	180
36	Guyana	240	125	India	180
37	Honduras	240	126	Laos	180
38	Kuwait	240	127	Mozambique	180
39	Panama	240	128	Palestinian Authority	180
40	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	240	129	Slovakia	180
41	United Kingdom	236.67	130	Myanmar	176.67
42	Dominican Republic	233.33	131	Mali	176.67
43	Guatemala	233.33	132	Mauritania	176.67
44	Jamaica	233.33	133	Turkey	176.67
45	Qatar	233.33	134	Algeria	173.33
46	Spain	233.33	135	Equatorial Guinea	173.33
47	Saint Lucia	233.33	136	Romania	173.33
48	Belize	230	137	Bosnia and Herzegovina	170
49	Cyprus	230	138	Cameroon	170
50	Italy	230	139	Estonia	170
51	Mexico	230	140	Guinea	170
52	Samoa	230	141	Jordan	170
53	Singapore	230	142	Syria	170
54	Solomon Islands	230	143	Sierra Leone	166.67
55	Trinidad and Tobago	230	144	Azerbaijan	163.33
56	Argentina	226.67	145	Central African Republic	163.33
57	Fiji	223.33	146	Macedonia	163.33
58	Israel	223.33	147	Togo	163.33
59	Mongolia	223.33	148	Zambia	163.33
60	São Tomé and Príncipe	223.33	149	Angola	160
61	El Salvador	220	150	Djibouti	160
62	France	220	151	Egypt	160
63	Hong Kong	220	152	Burkina Faso	156.67
64	Indonesia	220	153	Ethiopia	156.67
65	Kyrgyzstan	220	154	Latvia	156.67
66	Maldives	220	155	Lithuania	156.67
67	Slovenia	220	156	Uganda	156.67
68	Taiwan	220	157	Albania	153.33
69	East Timor	220	158	Malawi	153.33
70	Tonga	220	159	Chad	150
71	Chile	216.67	160	Côte d'Ivoire	150
72	Grenada	216.67	161	Niger	150
73	Mauritius	216.67	162	Eritrea	146.67
74	Namibia	216.67	163	Rwanda	146.67
75	Paraguay	216.67	164	Bulgaria	143.33
76	Thailand	216.67	165	Lesotho	143.33
77	Czech Republic	213.33	166	Pakistan	143.33
78	Philippines	213.33	167	Russia	143.33
79	Tunisia	213.33	168	Swaziland	140
80	Uzbekistan	213.33	169	Georgia	136.67
81	Brazil	210	170	Belarus	133.33
82	China	210	171	Turkmenistan	133.33
83	Cuba	210	172	Armenia	123.33
84	Greece	210	173	Sudan	120
85	Nicaragua	210	174	Ukraine	120
86	Papua New Guinea	210	175	Moldova	116.67
87	Uruguay	210	176	Democratic Republic of the Congo	110
88	Gabon	206.67	177	Zimbabwe	110
89	Ghana	206.67	178	Burundi	100

Nevertheless, Kahneman's remarks surely oversimplify the issue in thinking that happiness can all be narrowed down to facts and figures, or that happiness would be the same everywhere if everyone had the same material prosperity, which flies in the face of the experience of all of us, that there are many happy people of modest means and many unhappy people of great means.

As Ed Diener and Shigehiro Oishi write in The Nonobvious Social Psychology of Happiness:

"Bradburn (1969), in his classic seminal work on well-being, found that social relationships were one of the strongest correlates of positive emotions.... Newer evidence now suggests that close social relationships are not simply correlates of well-being, but may have causal force.... Many people focus on wealth when they pursue happiness, but research on social relationships suggests that they can be more important than material prosperity to subjective well-being. The word needs to be spread – it is important to work on social skills, close interpersonal ties, and social support in order to be happy. It is a mistake to value money over social relationships. For instance, we found that students who value money more than love are dissatisfied with their lives...."

Take a look at the happiness quotes found at many pages on the Internet, e.g. Wisdom Quotes.

Our own favorite quotation in this regard is from Abraham Lincoln, because we think that expectations determine happiness on a day to day basis. Abe said (quoted here from Quote World):

"People are just as happy as they make up their minds to be."