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How's Life? 2020

Measuring Well-being

image of How's Life? 2020

How’s Life? charts whether life is getting better for people in 37 OECD countries and 4 partner countries. This fifth edition presents the latest evidence from an updated set of over 80 indicators, covering current well-being outcomes, inequalities, and resources for future well-being. Since 2010, people’s well-being has improved in many respects, but progress has been slow or deteriorated in others, including how people connect with each other and their government. Large gaps by gender, age and education persist across most well-being outcomes. Generally, OECD countries that do better on average also feature greater equality between population groups and fewer people living in deprivation. Many OECD countries with poorer well-being in 2010 have since experienced the greatest gains. However, advances in current well-being have not always been matched by improvements in the resources that sustain well-being over time, with warning signs emerging across natural, human, economic and social capital. Beyond an overall analysis of well-being trends since 2010, this report explores in detail the 15 dimensions of the OECD Better Life Initiative, including health, subjective well-being, social connections, natural capital, and more, and looks at each country’s performance in dedicated country profiles.

English Also available in: French

Executive summary

The good news is that well-being has, in some respects, improved relative to 2010 – a year when the impacts of the financial crisis continued to be deeply felt in many OECD countries. We are living longer, safer lives. Across OECD countries, life expectancy has increased by more than one year, with the average baby born today living to over 80 years of age. The OECD average homicide rate has fallen by one-third since 2010, road deaths are down, and people feel safer when walking alone at night in their neighbourhoods. One in eight households live in overcrowded conditions, 3 percentage points fewer than in 2010. Income and jobs are on the rise - with both the employment rate and average household incomes increasing since 2010 by over 5 percentage points. Today, almost eight in every ten adults are in paid employment. Recent surveys suggest people are more satisfied with their lives, relative to how they felt in 2013.

English Also available in: French

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