Top 10 most miserable countries to live in
Measuring misery is not straightforward or an easy task. Some rankings, such as Hanke’s Annual Misery Index, are purely economic: They factor in inflation, unemployment, lending rates and growth of gross domestic product worldwide, to indicate where daily life feels financially intolerable.
All these perspectives have their limitations, of course, and more recent metrics like the United Nations’ Human Development Index (HDI) look at overall quality of life by factoring in variables on health, education and income. These different lenses can create contrasting pictures of hardship. Be it economic collapse, political turmoil or pitiful social services there are certain places that always crop up, when it comes to being difficult and miserable places to live.
Where happiness ranking measures joy and optimism, the HAMI does the opposite; it demonstrates economic suffering. Created by economist Steve H. Hanke, the index charts unemployment, inflation, lending rates and Gross Domestic Product growth as indicators of where financial hardship is most severe. The higher the score, the more that citizens suffer from excessive inflation, crushing borrowing costs, or out-of-control unemployment.
According to HAMI 2024, Sudan and Argentina both rated very high in global list while Syria is number one on the list even though Turkey and Venezuela are also crushed with economic disturbances. Here’s a deeper dive into the ten most miserable places in the world to live, 2024 edition.
Source: Steve H. Hanke, Hanke’s Annual Misery Index (HAMI) 2024, The Economist. Data compiled from World Population Review.
