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The first places were taken by Denmark, Sweden and Norway. Spoiler: Russia was not included in the top ten.
This rating is annually compiled by the American agency US News, based on data from the international consulting agency BAV Group and the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. Among the graduates of the latter, by the way, are Donald Trump, Elon Musk and Warren Buffett, so we can assume that the school’s specialists know their business.
The researchers conducted a survey that literally covered the whole world. When asking questions, they paid attention to many factors: observance of human rights, social policy in relation to families with children, the situation with gender equality, security, the development of public education and the health care system, their accessibility to the population, and the quality of income distribution.
In the first place in the ranking was Denmark… Despite the fact that the country has quite high taxes, the citizens there are quite happy with life.
“The Danes are happy to pay high taxes. They believe that taxes are an investment in their quality of life. And the government is able to meet these expectations, ”says Make Viking, CEO of the Institute for the Study of Happiness (yes, there is one).
Denmark is one of the few Western countries where a woman can go on maternity leave before giving birth. After that, both parents are given 52 weeks of paid parental leave. That is exactly one year.
In second place – Swedenwho is also very generous with maternity leave. Young parents are given as many as 480 days, and the father (or the mother, if after the end of this period the father will stay with the baby) 90 of them. It is impossible to transfer these days to another parent, it is imperative to “leave” all of them.
On the third place – Norway… And here there is a very humane policy regarding paid maternity leave. Young mothers can go on maternity leave for 46 weeks with full pay, for 56 weeks – with payment of 80 percent of the salary. Fathers can also take parental leave – up to ten weeks. By the way, in Canada also parents can go on maternity leave together. Apparently, for this Canada received the fourth place in the ranking.
For comparison: in USA maternity leave is not stipulated by law at all. For how long to let a woman go, whether to pay her while she is recovering from childbirth – all this is decided by the employer. Only four states have the option to go on paid maternity leave, which is cynically short: four to twelve weeks.
In addition, the ° ° RЎRєR RЅRґRёRЅR RІRёRё a very low crime rate and reliable social assistance programs – this also went into offset by separate pluses.
Russia it did not make it into the top ten champion countries. We took 44th place out of 73, behind China, USA, Poland, Czech Republic, Costa Rica, even Mexico and Chile. However, the rating was drawn up before Vladimir Putin proposed new measures to support families with children. Perhaps the situation will change by next year. In the meantime, even Greece, with their beggarly child benefits, has overtaken us.
By the way, USA also were not too high in the rating – in 18th place. According to the respondents, the situation there is very bad with security (shooting in schools, for example), political stability, access to health care and education, and income distribution. And that’s not counting the very tight-fisted policy regarding maternity leave. Here you really have to choose between a career and a family.
TOP 10 best countries for families with children *
Denmark
Sweden
Norway
Canada
Netherlands
Finland
Switzerland
New Zealand
Australia
Austria
TOP 10 worst countries for families with children *
Kazakhstan
Lebanon
Guatemala
Myanmar
Oman
Jordan
Saudi Arabia
Azerbaijan
Tunisia
Vietnam
*According to s