Canada slips in World Happiness rankings, due in part to social media use (opens in new tab)

I wonder if they may be confusing cause and effect. The cost of living in Canada's major cities is very high, while salaries are stagnant. The primary cause of that is the elevated price of housing.

The result is that large portions of the population, particularly younger folks, barely have the financial means to survive. This plus extreme weather and an absence of third places means they stay home. What do people do, then? Browse the Internet, social media, TV.

What else are they going to do, realistically? At least in places like Toronto.

Cost of living and the seemingly continuous drop in quality of life are playing a much bigger role than social media use. Trudeau's devastating policies may have done well for the pat-themselves-on-the-back-because-we're-so-great folks, but, the country is really not doing well.

Born and raised Canadian, but I lived outside of Canada in a non-OECD country for most of Trudeau's tenure, and returned a few years ago. The changes - almost all for the worse - in Canada during that period are quite astounding. And obvious to me as someone who rarely visited Canada until I moved back.

I think Canadians suffer a sort of a "boiling frog" thing, where the changes were gradual enough that they don't realize how much things have turned to crap.

My wife and I have already decided that we will leave Canada again once our son graduates high school. We stay here for him so he can be with his friends, and that is the only reason.

It's such a shame as the country truly has so much potential to be awesome, and I love the people here.

Source: https://www.worldhappiness.report/ed/2026/

CBC which gets $1b of tax payer money to promote only the sitting government, which they do none stop, thinks people are unhappy because of social media.

Terrible.