Best Countries To Be Born In

Small by population apparently, not size.

Yeah, I also don't get how people call Iceland a small nation, sometimes even a micronation. It is huge! (even if the population is small).

you should define small countries in the subtitles. seems like weak data. Is there a similar study that includes all countries?

It's hard to enjoy a quiz if the rules are not appropriately defined. Specially in a test such as this one, since among the countries with greater living standards are many small ones in one sense or another (Luxembourg, Andorra, Singapore,...)

it's by population

Where does it say that? Should be better explained.

SWITZERLAND!!!! :D

GERMANY!!!!! What are we doing?

DENMARKKKKKKKK :D

UNITED STATES!!!!!

I thought the grammar on the title is OK - what's wrong with it? And nice quiz, guys.

Some people believe that you shouldn't end a sentence with a preposition in English. That's because back in the olden days linguists tried to force the English (and many other languages) grammar to follow the rules of Latin as closely as possible, which of course is like trying to jam a square peg into a round hole. Often trying to avoid finishing a sentence with a preposition leads to comically complex phrases, which is rarely desirable. The title is fine, as was the quiz! :)

Good explanation. Plus, the title isn't a sentence, so it's even less of an issue.

Ending a sentence with a preposition is something I won't put up with.

Source says it is data collected from 80 countries and gives no explanation as to why the other 116 countries are 'ignored'. ... Meanwhile, I only speak English, so I guess I'm pretty lucky I was born in an English speaking country.

Note that the Englishest-speaking country is missing from this list: the UK. No wonder with their wacky NHS and inflammable housing.

First, the UK isn't the Englishest-speaking country - there's a quiz on that somewhere. Re the NHS - it's well-intentioned, and venerated as a sacred part of the national infrastructure, but it's under-funded and it's a huge (almost Soviet-style) bureaucracy. Quality of patient experience varies wildly - I've personally experienced both excellent and dreadful. You generally get treated as some kind of traitor if you point out that most other countries with universal healthcare seem to do it better (France is a particular good and particularly nearby example), but that doesn't stop it being true. Impressive that the US makes the list given its lack of universal healthcare, actually - shows how highly it must score in other areas.

What a dumb statement elbi. Wacky NHS? It's fine and would be even better if non-UK patients all settled their NHS treatment bills. Inflammable housing? One tower block had a tragic accident and the UK now has inflammable housing? I'd better warn my neighbours then!

Utt, oh....Trumpoid alert

Yeah, lucky I wasn't born in South Korea, since I don't speak Korean. Phew, close call!

I thought about typing Israel but didn't think it would be here since it said "safe". The only one I missed.

only democracy in the middle east, more safe than saudi arabia for women that's for sure

Please specify whether small means in size or population, as Iceland is bigger in area than South Korea, Ireland, Taiwan, and Belgium (I think). Apart from that great quiz

To be born as a male citizen is even better, I would assume.

Like all such lists based on a small number of data points there are going to be blind spots and those blind spots are illuminated best by countries that might score well in the criteria they consider while being far behind in other areas. The UAE being the best example on this list. And while Israel is a very nice and well-developed country (and safe most of the time), I'm guessing they didn't include some parts of the West Bank or any of Gaza.

based off of Material well-being as measured by GDP per capita (in $, at 2006 constant PPPS) Life expectancy at birth The quality of family life based primarily on divorce rates The state of political freedoms Job security (measured by the unemployment rate) Climate (measured by two variables: the average deviation of minimum and maximum monthly temperatures from 14 degrees Celsius; and the number of months in the year with less than 30mm rainfall) Personal physical security ratings (based primarily on recorded homicide rates and ratings for risk from crime and terrorism) quality of community life (based on membership in social organisations) governance (measured by ratings for corruption) gender equality (measured by the share of seats in parliament held by women)

South Korea has a dictator? What?

^ It wasn't a very well-composed sentence to be fair.

The data is from 2013. Even if what you say about the crime rates in Germany is true, the refugee wave started only in 2015, so this factor could not have been taken into account yet.

Finish reading the sentence, guys. He said the dictator was playing on the border.

That said, the UAE borders Saudi Arabia and Oman. Neither are "very violent." Saudi Arabia has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the world and Oman, by Middle Eastern standards, is downright pleasant. South Korea is a beautiful and peaceful country in spite of technically being at war with the north since the 1950s, and we can hope that the bluster from Pyongyang is not turned into all out catastrophe by the idiot currently occupying the White House; most analysts believe that it won't be. Germany and Scandinavia certainly have their problems, Muslim/South Asian rape gangs amongst them, though you'll find plenty of those in the UK as well. Shockingly large numbers of them, actually, many ineffectively prosecuted by police for fear of appearing racist. Meanwhile Iberia is still dealing with economic recession and massive unemployment. And they have immigrants, too.

kolp.... the ignorance in the comment you're calling out is still nowhere near as bad as that in the comments made on this site every day about the USA. See luxint's below, for example.

I think we can all agree that the world is deteriorating, even though we don't want it to.

No we can't. At what point in history was the world better than it is today?

¿Where is France and Spain? Only Spain Is better than most on the list.

2:53 left

Safe... Do you have to stay inside in Australia or does this include going out into the wirld with all the poisonous and dangerous animals that can kill you? IT'S A JOKE.

Please accept "ROK" for South Korea.

Israel? Yeah, right...

Yeah #1!

UAE...

Strange.. I tried North Korea three times and nothing.

Israel over France and the UK makes pretty good sense. Saudi wouldn't... but as kolp pointed out it's not on here. Maybe you're confusing Saudi Arabia with the United Arab Emirates? I've lost track of how many people I've known who didn't know the difference between the two.

Since everyone is obviously too lazy to make a single click, here's a breakdown of the criteria:

The independent variables in the estimating equation for 2006 include:
Material well-being as measured by GDP per capita (in $, at 2006 constant PPPS)
Life expectancy at birth
The quality of family life based primarily on divorce rates
The state of political freedoms
Job security (measured by the unemployment rate)
Climate (measured by two variables: the average deviation of minimum and maximum monthly temperatures from 14 degrees Celsius; and the number of months in the year with less than 30mm rainfall)
Personal physical security ratings (based primarily on recorded homicide rates and ratings for risk from crime and terrorism)
Quality of community life (based on membership in social organisations)
Governance (measured by ratings for corruption)
Gender equality (measured by the share of seats in parliament held by women)

My thoughts on this:
CLIMATE! yes finally a list that includes that. But... but... wtf!!?? FOURTEEN!!!?? 14 is NOT the ideal temperature. It would be maybe 25. Is this organization based in Iceland?

Material well-being, fine. Though I don't think GDP tells the whole story maybe include happiness index or suicide rates.

I would not count divorce rates as a bad thing. Having a realistic understanding of relationship dynamics and acknowledging that sometimes marriages ought to end is a good thing. Much better than, say, the Philippines where divorce is illegal. Though better to not get married at all.

Unemployment rate: probably as I guessed before a big part of why Spain is omitted.

Homicide rates: fair to look at. Though, while insecure Europeans *desperate* to find anything to cling to to prop up their sanctimonious condemnation of Americans as inferior love to jump on the lower homicide rates in *some* European countries as justification for her smugness, the difference in probability that you will be murdered in any of these countries is absolutely minuscule. The chance that you'll be the victim of terrorism is even less. Yes, even in Israel.

governance: hard to measure accurately.

gender equality: Good to include. But I can think of far better ways to measure this.

It's based on data points which I listed above. Of course someone had to choose which data points to factor in but aside from that it's not really a matter of opinion, with a few exception (such as the thing I pointed out above about the ideal temperature being a frigid 14 degrees Celsius.)

Incidentally I think there is another quiz on the site somewhere about which countries people most want to emigrate to. The USA obviously was at the top of the list for that one. But... maybe that's just a result of better PR? Hollywood? The fact that the US is full of immigrants and many people around the world have family there already? I don't think it's objectively the best place in the world to try and immigrate to. Howevver that's different from being the best place in the world to be born in.

Only ignorant people would try to claim that the US was somehow a bad place to live due to economics, life expectancy, or gender equality. It's not a product of poor education that people want to go there, though yes, American culture as depicted in Hollywood movies is definitely part of the draw. No need to smear immigrants to the US as uneducated just to prop up your own biases. I made a similar point immediately before yours but didn't feel the need to tag on the uneducated thing.

For Israel I'm sure it's great to be born a Jew but not a Palestinian

even Palestinian Jews are not safe

if by "Palestinian" you mean Israeli Muslim or Israeli Christian or Israeli who self-identifies as "Arab"... it's still far, far better to be born in Israel than in... Egypt, or Lebanon, or Jordan, or Syria, or Saudi Arabia, or Iraq, or the Islamic State, or Sudan, or Somalia, or Djibouti, or Eritrea, or Libya, or Iran, or Turkey, or Armenia.... those are your options in the area.
If by "Palestinian" you mean non-Israeli citizen born to parents from the "West Bank"... well... even if you live out your entire life in Ramallah or Nablus, you're going to be much better off than the average Syrian, Egyptian, Iraqi or resident of Daesh and you'll enjoy much better freedoms and opportunities than residents of Saudi Arabia or Iran. And you would also have greater opportunity to become an Israeli citizen than residents of Beirut or Amman which, if you pursued, would make your life better.
If by "Palestinian" you mean resident of Gaza, yeah, that would suck.

Great to see you are still out there, patrolling and giving comment in a detailed way. What would JetPunk do without you? Every site needs an........

Intellectual who knows what he’s talking about most of the time? I think that’s how that sentence goes.

If Napoleon Bonaparte can find time to whisper from the great beyond his thoughts on what it means to be born in Israel, I can find time to answer back with my own.

Thank the lord for Kalby. He (for he must be a he, surely Shirley) is a much needed JP eccentric. It gives him a role, if nothing else...gawd bless ya KB!

Taiwan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Living in New Zealand and loving it.

America is pretty far down the list in the minds of whoever created this list. It's the most guessed answer however, so I think we can see who's winning in the court of public opinion :-)

it's based on numbers not opinion.

Social welfare is incredibly strong... probably to the point of being excessive there. The government is very wealthy. It's GDP per capita score is probably the thing that gives it the most points on the above criteria. There are other problems with the UAE, though, and it falls short in most of the other metrics used for the list.

Taiwan isn't even a country

best way to deal with any information that contradicts your opinions.

Interesting quiz! <3 Israel <3

Both the Americans crying about the USA placing less than 1st, and the Europeans crying about the USA placing at all or above whatever country they happen to be from: you both look pathetic. And most of the people here commenting on the Middle East appear simply ignorant. Not going to reply to every one of you individually so this takes care of all of them...

Netherlands!! :)

It's an extremely safe country. Beautiful. Vibrant. Full of friendly people. Well developed. Clean. Rich in history and culture. I lived there for a while. Have you ever been?

What? The US is guessed most? There are way more countries where you live better.

The absence of Japan surprised me. In my opinion it's definately better to be born in Japan than (most of) The US