Where are the happiest families in Italy? They live in Florence, of course. The results of a recent survey conducted by the Monza and Brianza Chamber of Commerce rank Italian families’ level of happiness, revealing that the happiest families in the country, live right here.
The goal of the study was to compare the level of happiness in the northern region of Lombardy with that of other regions in Italy. Responses to the survey were ranked according to income and answers to questions in four categories: level of general satisfaction, work life, environment and neighbourhood.
The survey also probed families’ happiness levels in Italy’s provincial capitals. According to the survey results, Italy’s happiest families live in Florence, with only 18.9 percent of families responding saying they were ‘unsatisfied.’ The next happiest families were in Genoa (only 21.1 percent ‘unsatisfied’) and Palermo (21.8 percent ‘unsatisfied). In Milan, Bologna and Rome, approximately one in four families said they were ‘unhappy.’
Can money buy happiness? Tuscan families bringing home just 1,300 euro a month reported themselves as happy as those earning 1,500 euro a month in Italy’s richer, northern regions like Lombardy, Veneto and Emilia Romagna. Families in the regions of Liguria and Sicily said they needed from 1,200 to 900 euro a month to be happy.
However, ‘the global economic recession is a critical factor,’ says president of the Monza and Brianza Chamber of Commerce, Carlo Edoardo Valli, ‘that is accompanied by a sense of financial uncertainty among families, who need measures to safeguard their savings and more spending power.‘
