Standard of living ranking - Page 3

Shanis · (#21 (**permalink**))

Here's a now ranking from the Mercer Institute. To me it's kinda supprising but since it's only the top 50 every city can be proud to be on the list since there are thousands of citys in this world^^ Hope you enjoy reading

News Release: 2010 Mercer Quality of Living survey

noodle · (#22 (**permalink**))

These rankings are absolutely useless! You never know which to trust, and sometimes you wonder if these people that work on the rankings have ever actually stepped foot in these cities and/or countries.

2010 Quality of Life Index: 194 Countries Ranked and Rated to Reveal the Best Places to Live – International Living

Look at this article for example! France has been first for the past 5 years! I've been living in France, Paris for 4 years now, and the way they describe Paris makes me think these people judged Paris from romantic movies, poems or stories! Life in Paris is nowhere near as glamorous as they say, unless of course you're a millionaire! In which case, you can make almost any city/town you live in to be glamorous!

Nyororin · (#23 (**permalink**))

I too think they`re really close to useless too. I`m sure those at the bottom of the list are going to be pretty crappy places, but really... Everyone has different criteria for judging where they want to live, and for what they would consider an ideal place to be.
I`ve only lived in one city in that top 50 ranking, but I didn`t particularly like it there and wouldn`t choose to live there again. (And in fact got out pretty quickly as it certainly didn`t come close to what I would consider a good standard of living.) Now I live in a city not even on that list, and absolutely love living here - everything I looked for in a place to settle down for life is here.

It`s all subjective, really.

Shanis · (#24 (**permalink**))

Well they didn't judge any city by poems or something like that. They compared the job-markets, free-time-activity-offers, health system, etc. Nothing that can be seen from diffrent views. Well it could be they never stepped a food in it or city they prefer are ranked higher but I doubt that this is as useless as you think it is. Also this depends on the district you live in, some are just shit others are only for millionairs

noodle · (#25 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanis

Well they didn't judge any city by poems or something like that. They compared the job-markets, free-time-activity-offers, health system, etc. Nothing that can be seen from diffrent views. Well it could be they never stepped a food in it or city they prefer are ranked higher but I doubt that this is as useless as you think it is. Also this depends on the district you live in, some are just shit others are only for millionairs

I didn't say they did, I was merely pointing out that it was AS IF they saw a couple of movies or something when they describe it. The link I gave says they're using the following as criteria;

Cost of Living, Culture and Leisure, Economy, Environment, Freedom, Health, Infrastructure, Safety and Risk, and Climate.

As for the district, of course, but Paris in general isn't glamorous like that!

Nyororin · (#26 (**permalink**))

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shanis

Well they didn't judge any city by poems or something like that. They compared the job-markets, free-time-activity-offers, health system, etc. Nothing that can be seen from diffrent views. Well it could be they never stepped a food in it or city they prefer are ranked higher but I doubt that this is as useless as you think it is. Also this depends on the district you live in, some are just shit others are only for millionairs

I think that you pointed out the problem with this way of judging cities with that final sentence.

Let us say that there is a wonderful city, great variety of stuff, etc - but there are more "millionaires" living there than another city (probably because of said variety of stuff). As the cost of living for a millionaire is going to be high, looking at the average cost of living for everyone in the city will give you a skewed perspective - You will think that living there costs more as there are people paying quite a lot... But in reality the majority of people could be living with a much lower cost of living.

.............
And I was going to go into more detail until I noticed something I had not noticed before.
This is a ranking for expatriates. And short term ones at that.
It doesn`t have anything to do with the quality of life for native or long term residents. It`s all about how much a city impresses someone with money who lives there for a short period of time, and how much they can be catered to.

Well, that puts it all into perspective. The places I would want to live cater more to long term residents (with more opportunities open to them) than someone just here on business for a few months wanting to be "entertained".