Well it’s that time of year again for some cities to stand up and proudly beat their chests, and for others
to cower in shame: The annual Quality of
Living Index report has just been released.
The report is compiled to help businesses determine if they need to consider a “hardship allowance”
when sending their employees to work abroad. Thirty-nine “living determinants” are analyzed to create
the report, varying from censorship, theaters, availability of food, climate, housing, and more.
Interestingly, New York is the “base city” upon which all others are indexed. With this in mind,
the very best city according to the report is Zurich with a 108.2 index. Read literally, Zurich is 8% better than
New York. Baghdad, at just 14.5 has bagged last place and is 85.5% worse. Ouch.
American cities don’t make an appearance until Honolulu (103.3) pops up at 27th place, followed closely by
San Francisco (103.2). Time to start thinking about moving to Europe.
1 ZURICH Switzerland 108.2
2 GENEVA Switzerland 108.1
3 VANCOUVER Canada 107.7
4 VIENNA Austria
107.5
5 AUCKLAND New Zealand 107.3
6 DUSSELDORF Germany 107.2
7 FRANKFURT Germany 107.0
8
MUNICH Germany 106.8
9 BERN Switzerland 106.5
9 SYDNEY Australia 106.5
To Download the Top 50 click
here.