Liveable doesn’t mean loveable

When the bright lights of New York or the cultural-hub that is London-town gets ranked lower than Melbourne or Adelaide, what does the world’s ‘liveability’ ranking actually mean?

The Economist Intelligence Unit’s latest “liveability” ranking released earlier this week shows which cities are best to call home, but it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s the most vibrant or exciting.

The rankings are intended to measure the relative comfort of 140 cities where expat executives might conceivably find themselves living or visiting, according to Skift – which immediately excludes conflict hot spots such as Baghdad and Kabul.

Accordingly, companies use the results to calculate the “hardship” value and works out allowances to send employees to work there.

Therefore, “what’s “liveable” isn’t necessarily the same as what’s the most vibrant or exciting (which might come with some element of danger or inconvenience),” Skift explains.

Hence why the big, bright lights of New York or the rapid pace of crowded London ranks quite low in the list – 55^th and 56^th respectively.

“All suffer from higher levels of crime, congestion and public transport problems than would be deemed comfortable,” the EIU said.

Following suit from previous editions of the rankings, Australian cities usually get a good deal, as does Canadian hubs. This year Melbourne took out the top spot for the fourth year in a row, and being sparsely populated –  actually, fits in well with EIU’s methodology, skfit explains.

“They foster a range of recreational activities without leading to high crime levels or overburdened infrastructure.”

Vienna, Helsinki, and Auckland are also listed aside from other Australian and Canadian cities in the top 10.

In fact, every one of the top 64 cities scores high enough for a place in the top tier of liveability, and “should be considered broadly comparable,” according to the EIU.

“The research firm suggests that no extra payment should be needed to entice an expat moving to any of these cities, from Melbourne in first place to Santiago, Chile in 64th. By contrast, at least 20% of salary is recommended as a hardship allowance for expats dispatched to cities in the bottom tier, including Harare, Karachi, or Damascus,” Skift reports.

With the margin between Melbourne in first spot and New York in 56th place is relatively small (10.9 percentage points on a 100-point scale), what’s compelling according to Skift is the report’s “definitive ranking of cities”.

The list of most liveable cities in the world according to EIU:

1. Melbourne
2. Vienna
3. Vancouver
4. Toronto
5. Adelaide
6. Calgary
7. Sydney
8. Helsinki
9. Perth
10. Auckland
11. Zurich
12. Geneva
13. Osaka
14. Hamburg
15. Stockholm
16. Montreal
17. Paris
18. Frankfurt
19. Tokyo
20. Brisbane
21. Berlin
22. Copenhagen
23. Wellington
24. Oslo
25. Luxembourg
26. Amsterdam
27. Honolulu
28. Brussels
29. Munich
30. Pittsburgh
31. Hong Kong
32. Dusseldorf
33. Lyon
34. Barcelona
35. Washington DC
36. Atlanta
37. Chicago
38. Miami
39. Detroit
40. Boston
41. Seattle
42. Los Angeles
43. Minneapolis
44. Madrid
45. Cleveland
46. Dublin
47. Houston
48. Milan
49. Rome
50. Budapest
51. Manchester
52. San Francisco
53. Singapore
54. Reykjavik
55. London
56. New York

Do you think the Liveability Rankings are spot on?