An independent study ranked the Czech Republic as the 10th best country in the OECD to raise a family, well above the other Visegrad countries and all Eastern European countries. The country was ranked highest in safety, and the lowest in its (family) happiness, scoring an overall B+. Photo credit: Freepik / For illustrative purposes.
Czech Rep., Aug 12 (BD) – In a new independent study on the best countries to start and raise a family, the Czech Republic came relatively high, with an overall ranking of 10th. The rankings were based on 30 factors across six categories (safety, happiness, cost, health, education and time) and only included member states of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). While scoring mostly B’s and one A, the Czech Republic’s overall score was brought down by a D in the happiness index.
The Czech Republic’s highest score, an A, came for its perceived safety, ranking as the 6th safest country. The safety index took into account the homicide rate, people’s sense of personal security, its “Global Peace Index” in terms of safety and security, ongoing conflict and militarisation, the number of school shootings, and the degree to which governments protect and respect human rights.
Its poorest score, on the other hand, came from the “Happiness Index”, which measured citizens’ freedom as the absence of coercive constraint, how happy citizens perceived themselves to be, suicide rates, legal discrimination against LGBTQ+ families, and the national income gap for families. In this index the Czech Republic scored only a D, the 23rd happiest of the countries included in the research. Another poor scorer on this index was Hungary, the 4th “least happy” due to its relatively high suicide rate (15.1 per 100,000 citizens), low perceived happiness as according to the World Happiness Index (5.76) and low freedom.
In general, the Czech Republic’s fellow Visegrad countries scored much lower, with Poland at #20, Hungary at #21, and Slovakia at #27. Slovakia was also ranked the 5th worst country in terms of education, mainly because of its low enrollment rate among students aged 20 to 24 (32%), but also because of the lower mathematics, science and reading performance of 15-year olds.
According to the index, the top countries to raise a family are the Nordic ones; Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Finland took 1 to 4, with Luxembourg at number 5. At the other end of the list were Bulgaria, Turkey, Chile, the United States and Mexico.
The rankings included the 33 OECD countries (excluding Colombia, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia), plus Bulgaria and Romania. The OECD is a club of countries which are generally considered to be developed with high-income economies and a high Human Development Index. According to the researchers, these countries were chosen due to the availability of reliable data on the wide range of key indicators needed for the study.
Find the full ranking below:
- Iceland
- Norway
- Sweden
- Finland
- Luxembourg
- Denmark
- Germany
- Austria
- Belgium
- Czech Republic
- Netherlands
- Portugal
- France
- Australia
- Slovenia
- Ireland
- Spain
- New Zealand
- Canada
- Poland
- Hungary
- Switzerland
- United Kingdom
- Italy
- Japan
- Israel
- Slovak Republic
- Korea
- Greece
- Romania
- Bulgaria
- Turkey
- Chile
- United States
- Mexico
