How are you today? This stupid question, no matter how well meaning it may be, always presumes that you should be happy. Even when it comes from someone who has to ask it a hundred times a day, people appreciate the concern and answer it, as if they have a personal relation with the cashier. The expectation is that somehow everything is about happiness.
This mania has now been exalted by the United Nations into a World Happiness Day (March 20). In honor of the occasion, the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network publishes an annual World Happiness Report which ranks the nations of the world on a happiness scale. This is based on asking people around the world: on a scale of 1 to 10, how are you doing?