Global population expect harder year ahead

Respondents around the world expressed bleaker expectations for 2018

Notably, the global economic optimism index has been on a decline in the last 12 months and the study shows that only 28 per cent of the world now has an optimistic outlook on the 2018 economy, two point lower than the percentage of people having pessimistic outlook.

Net optimism (the number of respondents saying the next year will be one of economic prosperity minus those who expect a difficult year ahead) has shown a downward trend from +23 at the end of 2015 and +20 at the end of 2016 to -2 at the end of 2017.

For the second successive year, European citizens are significantly more worried about their prosperity (-16 net score). The challenges for the very future of the EU and Europe in general continued in 2017, creating uncertainties despite Europe’s emerging signs of recovery.

The US public opinion is deeply divided on economic expectations for the new year.

The most pessimistic countries are Italy (net score of -50) and Greece (net score of -42). Turkey is close behind (net score of -40). Nigeria (+59), followed by Vietnam (+55 net score) are on the most optimistic side.

Vietnam ranks second in overall economic prosperity with an increase of 8.0 points compared to last year.

Regarding the happiness index, more than half (59 per cent) of respondents claim they are happy. This is almost 10 points lower than twelve months ago. 2017 was a tough year with terrorist attacks almost every week and it may have influenced personal lives all around the world. Nevertheless, a majority in all polled countries remained happy.

The world today shares +49 net happiness compared to the +59 a year ago. Throughout 55 countries surveyed, 8 per cent said that they were unhappy, almost the same as the 9 per cent at the end of 2016 and the 10 per cent at the end of 2015.

Latin America seems to be the happiest continent in the world (net score of +66). Fiji is the happiest country, followed by Colombia with a net score of +86. Iran and Iraq are at the bottom with +5 and +7. The net happiness scores of the US and Russia are equal at +50.

Vietnam is in the top five happiest countries with a net score of +77, showing a slight decrease from the past three years.

The third is the hope index. A bit less than 40 per cent of the global respondents feel that 2018 will be better than 2017, which is 13 points down compared to a year ago. 23 per cent expect a worse year ahead. 32 per cent believe 2018 is going to be the same as 2017, and 6 per cent do not know.

The net score of +16 is twice lower than the net score of the last year.

A year ago, 15 per cent felt that a worse year was on its way, but nowadays their share is 23 per cent, resulting in a net score of +16. Compared to last year’s +37, the drop is obvious. The decrease reveals that the global population is turning worried as the world is turning into a more hectic and a less predictable place.

Indonesia (+66 net score) is this year’s winner and South Asia (+51) is the most optimistic region in the world. Europe is on the opposite with 0 score in its non-EU part and only +5 in the EU.

For instance, Bangladesh, India, and Vietnam, among others, score at about +50 in overall net optimism, while Greece is at -30 and Italy is at -41. Apparently, yet another bad-for-the-west-good-for-the-east year is coming.

Globally, hope is reserved for the fastest growing countries. Low income apparently goes well with hope, since there are prospects of growth.

In Vietnam, 58 per cent of the surveyed population considers that 2018 will be a better year for them, while 8 per cent consider it will be worse, making a net hope index of +50.

The Gallup International End of Year Survey is an annual tradition initiated by and designed under the chairmanship of Dr. George Gallup in 1977. This year’s survey was carried out by the Gallup International Association (GIA) in partnership with WIN (The Worldwide Independent Network of Market Research and Opinion Polls) in 55 countries around the world.

The survey is implemented in the EU, Armenia, East Asia, Middle and Afica, West Asia, simultaneously the US, India and Russia, which are three countries have been surveyed independently.

A total of 53,769 persons were interviewed globally. In each country a representative sample of around 1,000 men and women was interviewed either face to face (23 countries; n=24,235), via telephone (13 countries; n=11,656) or online (19 countries; n=17,878). The field work was conducted during November 2017 and December 2017. The margin of error for the survey is between +3-5 per cent at 95 per cent confidence level.

In Vietnam, the survey was implemented by Indochina Research (Vietnam) Ltd. with a representative sample of 1,000 people in urban districts of Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City through face to face interviews assisted by a digitally scripted questionnaire on tablets.