Australia is the lucky country in every way but one, according to OECD How’s Life? report

AUSTRALIANS are the happiest people in the developed world, except when it comes to one niggling thing. Can you guess where we fall behind?

Australia has been named the world’s happiest developed nation. Proud Aussies Sam, Melissa and Karina Adams are pictured at Geelong City Australia Day celebrations. Picture: Nathan Dyer

AUSTRALIA is the lucky country in every way but one, according to a new report.

We have been ranked as the happiest industrialised nation for the fourth year in a row, according to the OECD’s How’s Life? report.

When compared to 36 other developed nations, Australia performs strongly in 10 out of 11 wellbeing indicators.

The only area where Aussies fall down is in work-life balance, where we rank among the bottom 20 per cent of countries.

Based on 2382 people surveyed in the three years to March, Australians were most concerned with seeking a better balance between their work and personal lives.

This finding is backed up in an earlier University of South Australia study that found a quarter of Australians felt work frequently interfered with other life activities.

Australians say they want a better work-life balance.

Australia leads the world in the “civic engagement and governance” dimension, which reflects our high voter participation and healthy number of people who said they had volunteered their time or helped out someone.

We are also in the top 20 per cent when it comes to jobs and earnings, personal security, housing, health status and environmental quality.

Although job security seems to have been a major contributor to Australia’s high ranking, English cricketer Kevin Pietersen tweeted a different theory yesterday.

Australia has also fared well thanks to the nation weathering the global financial crisis better than the rest of the world.

“The average Australian household has generally been spared by the crisis, which in other OECD countries has been particularly visible when looking at household income, jobs, life satisfaction and civic engagement,” the report states.

Between 2007 and 2011, Australia’s cumulative household disposable income grew 9 per cent, which was one of the largest in the OECD, while countries in the eurozone fell by an average 1 per cent.

Turns out Aussies have got it pretty good. Picture: Megan Lewis.

Employment dipped only 0.5 of a percentage point during that time.

The favourable labour market conditions contributed to the percentage of Australian people declaring that they were very satisfied with their lives rising 1 percentage point to 77.

A stormy political landscape between 2007 and 2013 affected Aussies’ trust in institutions, with the percentage of people reporting that they trusted the government falling from 53 to 46.

Japanese respondents to the study were most worried about safety, while Latin Americans wanted better education and Danes strove for happiness.

More than 3.6 million people in 184 countries have used the OECD’s wellbeing barometer to measure and compare their quality of life based on their own priorities.

You can contribute to the Better Life Index here.

Australians lead the world in civic engagement.

Originally published as Australia is the lucky country in every way but one, according to OECD How’s Life? report