How do we decide which country is the best? What factors do we take into consideration?
According to usnews.com, countries are scored on each of the 65 country attributes which is based on individual responses to a survey.
The attributes are presented in this survey to over “21,000 people across the globe” (McPhillips, 2018) and they associate an attribute to a nation. These attributes are grouped into nine different sub rankings. The following is taken directly from usnews.com:
- Adventure friendly, fun, pleasant climate, scenic, sexy
- Citizenship cares about human rights, cares about the environment, gender equality, progressive, religious freedom, respects property rights, trustworthy, well-distributed political power
- Cultural Influence culturally significant in terms of entertainment, fashionable, happy, has an influential culture, modern, prestigious, trendy
- Entrepreneurship connected to the rest of the world, educated population, entrepreneurial, innovative, provides easy access to capital, skilled labor force, technological expertise, transparent business practices, well-developed infrastructure, well-developed legal framework
- Heritage culturally accessible, has a rich history, has great food, many cultural attractions
- Movers different, distinctive, dynamic, unique
- Open for Business bureaucratic, cheap manufacturing costs, corrupt, favorable tax environment, transparent government practices
- Power a leader, economically influential, politically influential, strong international alliances, strong military
- Quality of Life a good job market, affordable, economically stable, family friendly, income equality, politically stable, safe, well-developed public education system, well-developed public health system
This year, they took a look at 80 different countries, and we came in second, yet again! According to globalnews.ca, Canada scored a 9.7 whereas Switzerland scored a perfect 10 making Germany (which was last years’ #1 country) number 4 this year!
In the following, I have listed the score and ranking that Switzerland got based off of these sub rankings according to usnews.com
- Adventure:
- Score: 4.4
- Rank: #17
- Citizenship:
- Score: 9.8
- Rank: #2
- Cultural influence:
- Score: 5.6
- Rank: #7
- Entrepreneurship:
- Score: 8.9
- Rank: #5
- Heritage:
- Score:3.7
- Rank: #27
- Movers:
- Score: 4.0
- Rank: #28
- Open for business:
- Score: 9.3
- Rank: #2
- Power:
- Score: 2.7
- Rank: #17
- Quality of life:
- Score: 9.1
- Rank: #6
Economically, Switzerland is a strong country. The World Economic Forum has stated that Switzerland is the most competitive country due to its avoided debts and unemployment. It is a country that is not defined by one particular religion, language or ethnicity making it a diverse and harmonious country to live in.
Equality.ch states that Switzerland is working on gender equality “particularly in the legal domain, true equality of the sexes is still far from being a reality.” In my opinion, this is such an important aspect for all countries.
Ultimately, based on these statistics, Switzerland is being recognized for its overall efforts and balance. I have provided some links in the following that I have found interesting to read.