Bhutan, after prioritizing happiness, now faces an existential crisis

Admittedly I'm not familiar with bhutan. Besides basics, and buddhism connections. Lets take a look.

>Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay believes it is ironically the success of Gross National Happiness that has made young Bhutanese so sought after abroad.

They are 95th place for GDP.

125th place for HDI.

I wouldn't even consider working on 'happiness' with the numbers that bad.

Bhutan's balance of trade appears to be entirely negative. So the country is getting poorer.

Their GDP numbers are 5% growth every year? That seems impossible.

3% unemployment and 65% participation rate.

Lets call it a ~4-5% inflation average or worse.

6.8% interest rate, while never ever being below 6%? So they target what 5%? So its not that GDP growth at 5% is impossible. They are essentially saying they havent had gdp growth in decades, they are hiding a major depression?

In the last 10 years Bhutan has doubled their money supply, while population is leaving? LOL incoming government collapse.

government debt to gdp is ~130%. 100% is the magical threshold you're not allowed to cross. If you're the federal reserve and Tbills reputation might allow you to go above 100% like the USA in 2020... but Bhutan has no such ability. They likely cant cross ~40% if i were to estimate.

Major deficit spending across the last 25 years.

Sales tax of 50%

Income tax of 30%

>Bhutan was, and is today, largely a subsistence agricultural society. Many families still live in multigenerational farmhouses.

I'd be leaving as well. Nobody is seeking Bhutan people. The bhutan people are fleeing the inevitable.

Bhutan is about 20% debt/gdp from a venezuela level collapse. If by some magic they dont collapse there, they are about 40% from a greece like collapse.

Bhutan is already about 10% higher than the Sri Lankan collapse.

Fleee Bhutan while you can.

All this seems to be conjecture. Maybe its true that their economy will falter hard, maybe not.

I wish we could hear from actual Bhutanese people rather than look at statistics. I suspect the reason people leave is more complex than this.

Problem: Young bhutanese are fleeing the country and its a huge problem.

Government: "we're doing such a great job, people want to leave."

That's the conjecture, or is it more comedy?

Isn't GDP a particularly bad indicator for a society that's largely subsistence agriculture? They grow things and then eat them - does that even figure into GDP?

It boils down to applying western logic to a non western country. I get a little suspect that the statistics aren’t telling the full story.

I do think the government optimizing for happiness doesn’t equal optimizing for fulfillment, which isn’t always the same thing.

So people leave, despite perhaps a generally good happiness vibe. It’s like people who leave a Western European country for the US, because they feel their home countries can’t provide the experience they’re looking for.

Then again, it’s perhaps all a facade

> flagged for having my opinion

You'll sooner be bashed for gratuitous drama.

On topic: people both need meaning and creature comforts. No meaning, they'll wait for death; no comfort, they'll move, that was the brain is there for.

> Bhutan's balance of trade appears to be entirely negative. So the country is getting poorer.

This must be very much true of the US, too, then, and has been for a long time? Its trade balance is negative to the tune of tens of billions.

Subsistence farming, while possibly not counted in GDP, is an explanation why people don't starve to death. It's not really an argument that the country is doing "better than it seems", unless your baseline is famine.

It's all facade.

The fact that people are leaving in droves tells you all you need to know.

Unless the argument is that people are happier when imprisoned.

> I'm not familiar with bhutan > Fleee Bhutan while you can.

maybe familiarize yourself with the country at a deeper level before throwing out recommendations based on a few select metrics which may or may not be that relevant (GDP in particular is not a good metric)

is the more accurate baseline having food, 3 mortgages, a new phone and a laptop?

Heating and air conditioning, a comfortable apartment, being able to travel, health care to live long enough to see your kids grow old. Food that's cheap enough, so you always have something healthy and tasty to eat when you are hungry.

A pool in the garden is pretty fun on summer days, I imagine! It's cool to see the Niagara Falls, or the Norwegian fjords. Or visit a friend in a foreign country!

I don’t think anyone is comparing Bhutan to prison? That isn’t an apt comparison.

I’d be more interested in what young Bhutanese people have to say. If it’s economic opportunity they seek then it can be dealt with locally (and they seem to recognize that), if it’s something deeper that would also be very interesting to know.

Humans aren’t as rational as some like to believe

>This must be very much true of the US, too, then, and has been for a long time? Its trade balance is negative to the tune of tens of billions.

Quite true. The key difference here is that the USA is a reserve currency and those advantage give them far more breathing room in the balance.

But the USA isnt without the same consequences. The USA could be much wealthier per capita if they had a president who planned to put big tariffs in place.

No, but it's a reason that changes to the standard economic indicators won't give you as much of an insight into changes to people's quality of life.

>maybe familiarize yourself with the country at a deeper level before throwing out recommendations based on a few select metrics which may or may not be that relevant (GDP in particular is not a good metric)

Perhaps there's more analysis for you personally but when I look at those numbers.

30% poverty, 20-40% unemployment is coming. identical to their peers in similar financial situations.

I dont need any further analysis. What other 'deeper' facts do you want to look at?

How about a huge one I didnt even add.

Firearms per 100 people, places Bhutan about 196th in the world. They arent even a free country. Flee asap.

If the thing that drives your quality of life is subsistence farming then your quality of life is terrible.

No human except monks would choose such a life.

> Firearms per 100 people, places Bhutan about 196th in the world. They arent even a free country. Flee asap.

More firearms per people equals more freedom?

This has to be one of the worst rationales I have read on HN. Not an easy feat.

And I really struggled to post this while avoiding some harsher words. Also not an easy feat.

> Fleee Bhutan while you can

Leaving Bhutan for Australia and the US (often on a Refugee visa) is extremely popular in Bhutan nowadays [0]. If you live in the Bay Area, there is a large Bhutanese (as well as Nepali, Indian Tibetan, and Himachali) diaspora in the East Bay.

> Their GDP numbers are 5% growth every year? That seems impossible

They are a large energy exporter who exports much of their energy to Northeast India and Bangladesh.

That said, most infrastructure is owned and operated by Indian conglomerates like Tata Group or Indian SoEs.

> Bhutan is about 20% debt/gdp from a venezuela level collapse. If by some magic they dont collapse there, they are about 40% from a greece like collapse

The Indian government will prop up Bhutan no matter what. Several of India's forward deployment bases are located in the country, and it is critical for defending much of Northeast India from China.

If Bhutan gets even the slightest bit wobbly or shifts direction, India would probably "absorb" Bhutan the same way it did Sikkim in 1973.

[0] - https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/bhutans-jobs-woes...

Maybe, maybe not. The point is that the GDP of the country you're in going up or down is a somewhat abstract and irrelevant concern for a subsistence farmer

I think it's possible that some of them have beautiful lives anyway, but tough, no doubt. I've been to some similar villages in Ladakh

> Firearms per 100 people, places Bhutan about 196th in the world. They arent even a free country. Flee asap.

LOL. This is either Onion level sarcasm, or a seriously warped view of what constitutes freedom.

But at least it made it easy for me to discount your other points.