Objective: To provide recommendations for a newly launched government aiming to improve well-being and attract tourism. Approach: The relationship between economic conditions and happiness across countries were assessed, combining two external datasets into a relational SQL database to test how factors like health, GDP, and working hours influence national happiness.
Source: https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/unsdsn/world-happiness/data
Includes: happiness score, social support, freedom, generosity, corruption, healthy life expectancy (scaled), and global ranking.
Source: https://www.rug.nl/ggdc/productivity/pwt/?lang=en
Includes: population, GDP per capita, real consumption, human capital index, and average working hours.
We built a simple 1:1 relational model with:
Happiness Table --> Well-being indicators for each country.
Economy Table --> Economic indicators for the same countries.
Linked via the shared Country field, allowing us to explore relationships using SQL JOINs.
Key steps:
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Standardized and matched country names
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Fixed incorrect column types and naming mismatches
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Removed a duplicated column causing import errors
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Clarified the meaning of scaled variables (e.g., life expectancy index)
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Ensured both datasets aligned cleanly before analysis
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Higher healthy life expectancy → higher happiness → Supported by the data.
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Longer working hours reduce happiness more in high-GGDP countries → Partially supported.
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Working hours alone show a weak effect, but GDP influences how much happiness is impacted.
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SQL (JOIN, GROUP BY, ORDER BY, CASE, subqueries)
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ERD modelling
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Descriptive statistics for selecting the most meaningful variables
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Health is one of the strongest drivers of happiness.
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GDP per capita shapes how resilient a country is to long working hours.
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The happiest countries tend to have: strong healthcare, high GDP, social support, low corruption, and reasonable working hours.
To increase happiness and attract tourism, our new country should:
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Invest in public health and prevention
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Strengthen economic opportunities
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Promote work-life balance
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Improve governance and social trust
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Build a tourism identity around well-being and quality of life