What country has the best cost-of-living to quality-of-life balance?

What country has the best cost-of-living to quality-of-life balance?

Gen added an answer. 10:36am • 2 Answers • Unfollow

1

Gen Shibayama, United 1k for 6+ years.

Here is the ranking of countries with highest purchasing power by Numbeo. http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-li...

Local Purchasing
Power shows relative purchasing power in buying goods and services in a given
city for the average wage in that city. If domestic purchasing power is 40,
this means that inhabitans of that city with the average salary can afford to
buy 60% less typical goods and services than New York City residents with an
average salary.

While it does not directly indicate "Quality of Life", it does show Quality of Life in terms of consumption.


Country     Local Purchasing Power Index

Switzerland 137.93
United States     114.8
Australia   114.38
Sweden      113.44
Germany     106.83
Finland     106.55
Ireland     99.42
Japan 97.83
Cyprus      97.66
Canada      96.05
Austria     89.59
Belgium     88.32
United Kingdom    87.63
South Korea 85.25
Singapore   76.79
Denmark     74.09
France      70.52
United Arab Emirates    70.1
Norway      69.06
Netherlands 68.55
Turkey      62.17
Malaysia    61.73
Greece      61.27
Brazil      59.25
South Africa      57.81
Bahrain     56.04
Slovenia    54.44
Czech Republic    54.35
Chile 53.34
Hong Kong   53.18
Poland      52.2
Spain 52.14
Mexico      51.43
Israel      51.37
Italy 50.98
Portugal    48.52
Croatia     45.89
India 43.55
Lithuania   43.27
Bolivia     43.06
Argentina   40.6
Ukraine     39.99
Latvia      38.35
Iran  38.03
Ecuador     37.86
Pakistan    37.36
China 36.79
Russia      36.33
Venezuela   36.23
Serbia      35.21
Colombia    32.49
Hungary     32.47
Bulgaria    31.49
Bosnia And Herzegovina  31.29
Thailand    30.76
Montenegro  29.73
Albania     27.41
Romania     24.32
Jordan      22.11
Indonesia   20.4
Paraguay    19.46
Belarus     12.82


The below is Economist Intelligence Unit's 2005 Quality of Life Index / Country Ranking. http://www.economist.com/media/p...

The survey uses nine quality of life factors to determine a nation's score[1]. They are listed below including the indicators used to represent these factors:

1. Health: Life expectancy at birth (in years). Source: US Census Bureau

2. Family life: Divorce rate (per 1,000 population), converted into index of 1 (lowest divorce rates) to 5 (highest). Sources: UN; Euromonitor

3. Community life: Variable taking value 1 if country has either high rate of church attendance or trade-union membership; zero otherwise. Source: World Values Survey

4. Material well being: GDP per person, at PPP in $. Source: Economist Intelligence Unit

5. Political stability and security: Political stability and security ratings. Source: Economist Intelligence Unit

6. Climate and geography: Latitude, to distinguish between warmer and colder climates. Source: CIA World Factbook

7. Job security: Unemployment rate (%.) Source: Economist Intelligence Unit

8. Political freedom: Average of indexes of political and civil liberties. Scale of 1 (completely free) to 7 (unfree). Source: Freedom House

9. Gender equality: Measured using ratio of average male and female earnings. Source: UNDP Human Development Report

Top 20 countries are:
1     Ireland    8.333
2     Switzerland      8.068
3     Norway     8.051
4     Luxembourg 8.015
5     Sweden     7.937
6     Australia  7.925
7     Iceland    7.911
8     Italy      7.810
9     Denmark    7.797
10    Spain      7.727
11    Singapore  7.719
12    Finland    7.618
13    United States    7.615
14    Canada     7.599
15    New Zealand      7.436
16    Netherlands      7.433
17    Japan      7.392
18    Hong Kong  7.347
19    Portugal   7.307
20    Austria    7.268

Hope it helps!