Every year Mercer presents a Quality of Living Report naming the cities all over the world with the highest quality of living. Not one city in the United States made it into the top 5 list of highest quality cities this year, but one did make it onto the list of cities with the highest quality of living in North America. The other four cities in the top 5 all belong to Canada.
The purpose of this survey is to help employers figure out how to create fair levels of compensation for their employees all over the world, including locally and internationally. What the company uses to decide what makes for high quality living includes everything from social and economic environments, political stability and housing. Public transportation is also a consideration in finding the cities with the highest quality of living. These factors will help employers figure out not only fair pay, but other employment options and opportunities as well.
In North America, the five cities with the highest quality of living – in order – are: Vancouver, Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal and San Francisco. Vancouver is number five on the list of five best cities in the world with the highest quality of living. The rest of the top five in the world are all European cities; Vienna, Zurich, Auckland and Munich. Of course, it’s no surprise that European cities dominate the list. They have much higher quality health care and lower crime levels as a whole.
Not to be left out, however, is the Asian sector. The top five spots are dominated by four Japanese cities including Toyko, Yokohama, Osaka and Kobe, while the number one highest quality of living city in Asia is Singapore. It seems that on any given continent the quality of living is simply much better in some countries than in others.
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