The May wave of the Ipsos IndiaBus Happiness Monitor 2024 shows a slight uptick in happiness (of 1 percentage point) over the previous month, with at least 77 PERCENT urban Indians claiming to be happy; and with a major jump in happiness among full time parents/ homemakers (84 percent, +5 percent), and females (80 percent, +3 percent), maybe to do with much reprieve from morning drill of schools, with the onset of the summer vacation and the holiday season.
Some cohorts were seen to be more happy: like those from north zone (86%), west zone (85%) and east zone (80%), tier 1 cities (88%), 45+ (80%) and from
SEC A households (80%). While, largely across demographics over 70 per cent citizens were seen to be happy, the only exception continued to be the south zone with only 1 in 2 claiming to be happy (54%, -1%), and seeing a 1% dip over April. SEC C saw an increase in happiness of 5% points to 76%, while students (78%,+2), those with high education (78%, +2) and low education (77%, +1) also reported increase in happiness levels.
How happy are Indians in their daily lives
The survey also captured happiness across a host of parameters and interestingly for most of the parameters, citizens reported an increase in happiness over the previous month. Happiness was seen most around family (79%, +1%), followed by health (74%, =), friends’ circle (72%, +1%), employment (67%, -2%), colleagues (66%,+1%), economic conditions (64%, +3%), neighbours (64%, +4%) and situation in the country (63%, +1%) and situation in the world (58%,=).
Summarizing on the findings of the survey, Parijat Chakraborty, Group Service Line Leader, Public Affairs, Corporate Reputation, CSR and ESG, said, “We see
improvement in happiness scores across most demographics and parameters. Those from north, west and east zone are happier than their counterparts from south zone. Also, tier 1 residents are happiest, which could be because of the good quality of life – decent income with lower cost of living, as compared to the metros.
Also homemakers/ full time parents have seen an uptick in happiness scores, maybe to do with the summer break for children and the holiday season. We see an interesting trend around economic conditions and work – while citizens claim to be happier around their economic conditions, at the same time happiness around work has seen a dip. Probably it reaffirms that money needs hard work to grow. There is stability seen around their views
around the prevailing situation in the country and the situation in the world. The survey clearly shows that happiness is not just a feeling but impacted by different areas in one’s daily life. And any major alterations in the situations can upset the happiness apple
cart.