Mercer Consulting company published its latest ranking of cities which offer better quality of life. The list is topped by Vienna, Zurich is the second, followed by Geneva, Vancouver and Auckland. There are16 cities of Western Europe in top-25 and, according to Mercer experts, it demonstrates the suitability of this region to people's life. Minsk is ranked as just185th in the list.
«In Western Europe, the general standard of living is higher than the average for the world … Despite the financial crisis, the region shows the best results on such factors as schools, housing, recreation, entertainment and community services», reads the company’s reportю.
A total number of world cities in the rating is 221. Kiev obtains the 161st place, five positions ahead of Moscow (166th). However, among the cities of the former Soviet Union in the top-100 of the list there are only capitals of Baltic republics, joined the EU: Vilnius (79), Tallinn (89) and Riga (91). The worst city to live is Baghdad.
In calculating the ranking’s position, Mercer specialists took into account such indicators as crime rate, political stability, number of hospitals and quality of health care, convenience of transport system, presence of cafes and restaurants, recreation areas, climate conditions, level of personal freedom and other factors — 39 criteria in total.
The list is intended to help management of large international companies to assess working conditions of their employees, to select staff in a right way and define the level of employees’ payment.
At the same time, New York City is taken as the starting point, which gets 100 points of living level each year, and other cities are compared with its standards of living. This year’s the «Big Apple» is 49th in the list.
To remind, last year’s ranking first place also got the capital of Austria, and Swiss Zurich and Geneva were the second and third respectively.
A source: korrespondent.net
