For the interest of readers I am listing the results of a survey in Bhutan on Gross National Happiness:

– Men are happier than women on average.
– Of the nine domains, Bhutanese have the most sufficiency in health, then ecology, psychological wellbeing, and community vitality.
– In urban areas, 50% of people are happy; in rural areas it is 37%.
– Urban areas do better in health, living standards and education. Rural areas do better in community vitality, cultural resilience, and good governance.
– Happiness is higher among people with a primary education or above than among those with no formal education, but higher education does not affect GNH very much.
– The happiest people by occupation include civil servants, monks/anim, and GYT/DYT members. Interestingly, the unemployed are happier than corporate employees, housewives, farmers or the national work force.[1]
– Unmarried people and young people are among the happiest.
– There is quite a lot of equality across Dzongkhags, so there is not a strict ranking among them. The happiest Dzongkhags include Paro, Sarpang, Dagana, Haa, Thimphu, Gasa, Tsirang, Punakha, Zhemgang, and Chukha.
– The least happy Dzongkhag was SamdrupJonkhar (this is a coal mining area, near to Assam,
– The ranking of dzongkhags by GNH differs significantly from their ranking by income per capita. Sarpang, Dagana, and even Zhemgang for example, do far better in GNH than in income.
– In terms of numbers, the highest number of happy people live in Thimphu and Chukha (commercial and financial centre of Bhutan) – as do the highest number of unhappy people!
– Thimphu is better in education and living standards than other Dzongkhags, but worse in community vitality.

Without an intimate knowledge of Bhutan, one might conclude that that country doesn’t sound so different to most Western countries: men are happier than women (I wonder why!), people in towns are happier than in the countryside, marriage doesn’t necessarily denote a happy life, etc