Every year, Mercer puts together a Cost of Living ranking, analysing the most, and least, expensive cities around the world for international workers to move to. While some cities have moved considerably in the list this year, the first spots remained the same, with Hong Kong, Singapore and Zurich topping the list.
To compute the ranking, Mercer assessed the comparative costs of over 200 items in 226 cities across 5 continents. The cost comparison is based on a survey conducted in March 2024 in over 400 cities and takes into account indicators such as housing, transportation, food, clothing, household goods and entertainment. A basket of everyday items used for the calculations, includes 12 large eggs, 1 litre of olive oil, an espresso coffee at popular café, 1 litre of unleaded gasoline (95 octane), men’s blue jeans, and women’s shampoo, haircut and styling.
New York City was used as a baseline city for the comparison and currency movements were measured against the US dollar, with exchange rates from March 2024. Establishing a baseline ensures that the comparison remains consistent throughout the ranking. Moreover, taking NYC and the US dollar as base, instead of comparing the cost of the indicators to each country’s average salary, gives the list its expat angle.
The top 10 has few significant changes from last year, with the top 5 remaining unchanged: Hong Kong, Singapore, Zurich, Geneva and Basel, the latter 3 all being in Switzerland. Another Swiss city, Bern, took 6th place, swapping places with New York, which is now in the 7th position. London climbed 9 spots from last year, taking 8th place and, completing the top 10, Nassau, in the Bahamas, and Los Angeles took 9th and 10th place respectively, both having climbed by one spot since last year.
“Cost-of-living challenges have had a significant impact on multinational organizations and their employees”, said Yvonne Traber, Mercer’s global mobility leader. “It is important for organizations to stay informed about cost-of-living trends and inflation rates and seek input from employees on these issues to effectively manage their effects.”
Throughout the ranking the biggest changes are for Lagos, Nigeria, and Luanda, Angola, which dropped 178 and 128 places respectively. Also in Nigeria, Abuja dropped 86 places, while, on a positive change, Ghana’s Accra climbed 80 spots to the 98th position. Chile’s Santiago dropped 73 places, while Ethiopia’s Addis Ababa climbed 56 and Türkiye’s Istanbul climbed 55. Osaka, in Japan, dropped 53 spots, and, while the last big changes came from Tirana, in Albania, and Cairo, in Egypt, which climbed 50 and 59 spots respectively.
Inflation and cost of housing were the biggest influencers on the ranking, varying greatly from city to city. For example, Buenos Aires saw a 694% increase in olive oil prices, while Istanbul saw a 145% rise. Similarly, housing rental prices increased by 301% and 141% in Türkiye’s Istanbul and Ankara respectively, while in the Swiss cities of Basel, Bern and Geneva, the increase remained under 4%. At the other end of the spectrum, rental prices in the Israeli capital of Tel Aviv decreased by 22% as the country remains in the midst of war.
