Young adults in the Netherlands are a lot less happy than 25 years ago. This is apparent from a study published on Wednesday into happiness and well-being by Statistics Netherlands (CBS). Across the board, the feeling of happiness among Dutch adults has declined in recent years, although a large majority of adults still consider themselves happy.
Since 1997, CBS has been researching happiness and satisfaction among the Dutch population. In this survey, adults were asked to rate themselves from 1 to 10 on these two aspects. A number of 7 or higher means someone is considered happy, a 5 or 6 means ‘not happy, not unhappy’ and a number of 4 or lower means someone is unhappy.
81 percent of 18 to 25-year-olds said they would be happy in 2021. While this group was still the happiest age group in 1997 at 91 percent, in 2021 this group experienced the least happiness in relative terms. The figure for young adults is lower than the average for the Dutch adult population, which is 86 percent.
Last year, 84 percent of Dutch adults said they were satisfied with their lives. For the specific age group of 18 to 25 years, this figure is 77 percent. Over the past two years, both the happiness and satisfaction feeling have decreased in all age groups, which may be related to the corona pandemic.