Household Bills
Hong Kong named world’s most expensive expat city
Hong Kong tops the list of most expensive cities for expats, pushing Luanda in Angola to second position, according to an annual study by consultancy firm Mercer.
Zurich and Singapore remain in third and fourth place, respectively, while Tokyo is in fifth, up six places from last year. Kinshasa, ranked sixth, appears for the first time in the top 10, moving up from thirteenth place.
Other cities in the top 10 of costliest cities for expats are Shanghai (7), Geneva (8), N’Djamena in Chad (9), and Beijing (10).
The world’s least expensive cities for expats, according to the survey, are Windhoek in Namibia (209), Cape Town (208), and Bishkek in Kyrgyzstan (207).
The survey is designed to help multinational companies and governments determine compensation packages for their expat employees.
New York City is used as the base city for all comparisons and currency movements are measured against the US dollar.
The survey includes over 375 cities throughout the world. This year’s ranking includes 209 cities across five continents and measures the comparative cost of more than 200 items in each location, including housing, transportation, food, clothing, household goods, and entertainment.
Coming in third place, Zurich remains the costliest European city, followed by Geneva in eighth place.
In the UK, London fell five places to 17th, Birmingham fell 14 places to 96 and Glasgow fell 10 places to 119.
