Measuring unhappiness

Happy citizens are essential for building a harmonious society, says a signed article in China Youth Daily. An excerpt follows:

China Xiaokang magazine conducted a survey recently on the happiness index. The online survey, in which more than 20,000 netizens participated, shows the current happiness index is 79.3 on a scale of 100. This is a little higher than the 78.1 of 2005. The survey concluded that "with the deepening of reform, speeding up of social transition, enlarging of income gaps and imbalance of interest distribution, people tend to have increasingly negative and resistant psychology." At the same time, the Internet has become a place for netizens to express their unhappy sentiments.

The survey by China Xiaokang shows that social inequality and huge income gaps are the major reasons for people's unhappiness. To a certain degree, the netizens' resentment represents common feelings of the public.