NewsTracker Answers for week of Sep. 16, 2013

Q: Denmark was listed as the world's happiest nation in the United Nations second World Happiness Report which used factors such as GDP, life expectancy, social support, "perceptions of corruption", and "freedom to make life choices", to rate countries. Where is Denmark on this map?

Circle the area on this map

Q: The report ranked Togo as the least happy of the 156 countries in the study. Where is Togo?

A. Polynesia

B. Southeast Asia

C. South America

D. Western Africa

D. The bottom five nations were relatively poor countries in Africa while the top five nations were relatively rich countries in Europe.

Q: While wealth was a big factor in how nations ranked in the study, the nation with the world's wealthiest population only ranked 27th in happiness. Which country has the largest gross domestic product (GDP) per person?

A. Norway

B. Qatar

C. Saudi Arabia

D. United States

B. Each person's share of the national annual income in Qatar is $103,900, more than twice as much as the $50,700 per capita in the United States and nearly 100 times more than Togo's $1,100. Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Norway all derive much of their wealth from oil. But, factors besides wealth placed Norway second in the happiness rankings.

Q: The United States ranked 17th in the happiness study. Which nation bordering the United States ranked lower in the report?

A. Canada

B. Mexico

C. Russia

D. All of the above

C. Russia, which shares a maritime border with Alaska in the Bering Sea and Arctic Ocean, ranked 68th in happiness. Canada ranked sixth and Mexico ranked 16th in the UN report.

Q: Besides Denmark and Norway, the Nordic nations of Finland, Iceland and Sweden all ranked among the the top ten happiest nations. Which of these languages is NOT closely related to Danish?

A. Finnish

B. Icelandic

C. Norwegian

D. Swedish

A. Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian and Swedish speakers can often understand each other well. These Scandinavian languages are derived from Old Norse and are part of the Germanic language group which also includes English. However, Finnish belongs to the Uralic language group and is more closely related to Estonian and Hungarian.