Citizens' Ratings of Quality of Life and Hope for the Future Across 29 Countries

How do people in different countries around the world see their lives today and their prospects for the future?

The Economist/Angus Reid World Poll, conducted in 29 countries during May and June, assessed citizens' ratings of their current quality of life, and their future expectations -- for next year, for ten years hence, and for the generation of their children. The Angus Reid Group undertook a similar sounding of public opinion in the spring of 1997.

A "Hope Index" has been calculated from these three items to provide a more holistic reading of people's outlook for the future. Through the "Hope Index", the proportion of a population that can be described as solidly optimistic about their future prospects can be distinguished from the rest of the population. To be counted among that group, a survey respondent had to be optimistic on at least two of the three expectation questions and neutral, not pessimistic, on the third. In constructing the hope index, greater weight was given to people's expectations for the years further ahead to ensure that the index is not overly sensitive to shifts in consumers' immediate outlook.

The results of this Economist/Angus Reid World Poll provide some interesting insights into the current mood and the levels of optimism in different parts of the world. The key highlights of this analysis include:

Optimism of youth endures

The survey results offer reassuring evidence that the optimism of youth endures. Across the entire sample of 29 countries and 15,669 individuals, younger people (under 35) show much more optimism than their middle-aged and older (55+) counterparts. Looking at the overall "Hope Index" scores, these spike upward from a score of "17" among those over 54 years, to "41" among the respondents aged 35 to 54, to "55" among those aged 18 to 34. This generation gap is evident across all regions of the world; in fact, young people in depressed eastern Europe are more bullish about their futures than older people in North America.

North and South Americans upbeat about current quality of life and prospects for the future

Americans have a much brighter outlook; indeed, they show among the highest exuberance for both their current quality of life and their prospects for the future. Canadians share a milder case of this bullishness.

Two of the three South American countries surveyed -- Colombia and Brazil -- display very high optimism (both involved urban-only samples).

Asians foresee a bright future… but are bleak about current situation

Asian countries show notably high optimism. According to the overall "Hope Index" scores, five of the 10 most optimistic countries sampled were in Asia: Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and China (the latter two are urban samples). Asia was also among the most optimistic in the 1997 sounding. This consistency suggests that the region's economic difficulties have not dampened Asians' confidence in their collective future.

Conversely, in Japan, the "Hope Index" ratings are among the lowest. The survey results demonstrate that a solid majority of Japanese worry that their children's generation will be worse off than their own.

Asians give considerably more modest ratings to their current overall quality of life: typically between 25 percent and 33 percent of Asian respondents expressed very high satisfaction with their quality of life.

Western Europeans satisfied with the current quality of life… but don't anticipate much promise for future

In Western Europe, meanwhile, the pattern tends toward the reverse: people show much higher satisfaction with their current quality of life, but palpable concern about the future (especially in France and Germany, where half of the populations do not have great expectations for future generations).

Polish and Russian respondents profoundly pessimistic

Some of the most profound pessimism is found in Poland and Russia, and these two countries have also shown the biggest changes in outlook -- for the worse -over the course of the past year. Unlike western Europeans, eastern Europeans are most concerned about the short-term and display decidedly more confidence about the longer term.

These results emerged from an international public opinion survey conducted by the Angus Reid Group on behalf of selected clients, including The Economist. This poll involved interviews among a total of 15,669 adults in 29 countries. Data collection was carried out in May and June of 1998.

The target sample size was 500 for each country, with the exception of a 1,000 sample size in urban China and the United States. In 23 of these 29 countries, a full national probability sample was used. The other six countries involved urban-only sampling: Brazil, China, Colombia, Russia, South Africa and Thailand. In-person interviewing was used for all urban-only samples and in Argentina; in all other countries sampled, interviewing was conducted via telephone.

The Angus Reid Group is Canada's premier market research and public opinion polling firm with offices across Canada and the United States. The company also provides international clients with a regularly scheduled quarterly global polling program wherein upwards of 30 countries over a two month timeframe are sampled for opinions on private sector and public matters. The group also publishes, on a quarterly basis, The World Monitor, a digest of world public opinion trends and insights gleaned from its world polling activities.

The London-based Economist is an international weekly -- covering world politics, business, finance, science and the arts -- and is read by more of the world's top national and business leaders than any other magazine.

For more information on this news release, please contact:

W. John Wright
Senior Vice-President
Angus Reid Group
(416) 324-2900

Additional information can be found at:

The Economist Web Edition (www.economist.com)