The most expensive city in the world is still Singapore, a group of economists said.
For the third consecutive year, Singapore took the top spot at the annual top 10 ranking conducted by research and analysis group Economist Intelligence Unit.
Swiss city Zurich tied with Hong Kong for the second spot on the list. Geneva ranked fourth, while Paris ranked fifth.
The EIU released the "worldwide cost of living survey", in which it summed up the costs of living in cities across the globe as of September 2015, and compared each cost to other cities, as well as the cost of living inside the city one, five and 10 years ago.
Specifically, the report compared 400 individual prices across 160 services and products in cities all over the world.
All of the cities in the list, except New York City and Hong Kong, had notably lower costs of living in 2015 than they did in 2010.
New York City, which ranked No. 7 in the survey, was actually used as baseline. The city rose to seventh place from the 22nd spot last year. In 2011, NYC was as far down as the 49th spot.
According to the Wall Street Journal, volatile exchange rates have "rippled through the survey." So although the cost of living in NYC did not rise for residents over the past year, the survey revealed that the city is expensive because the dollar strengthened. The prices of goods and services in NYC relative to other countries were high.
Meanwhile, the cost of living in Tokyo dropped significantly over the course of five years. It was the world's most expensive city in 2010, but it now ranks 11th. Although it is still far from "affordable", it is still a better bargain than in London, which ranked seventh; and in Los Angeles, Seoul and Copenhagen, which all tied for the eighth spot.
Other cities in the United States were ranked as follows: Chicago at rank 21; Minneapolis at rank 24; Washington, D.C. at 26; Houston at 31; San Francisco at 34; Seattle at rank 42; Honolulu and Pittsburgh at rank 46; Miami at rank 49; and Boston at rank 56.
Russian cities Moscow and St. Petersburg saw the largest decline in the past year at a 40 percent drop in living costs.
The EIU's survey had one caveat: although it included the cost of household goods, food and transportation, and clothing, it did not include the cost of shelter. Experts said this may make the ranking less meaningful, and this may explain why other expensive cities in the U.S. such as San Francisco do not rank higher.
Photo : David Russo | Flickr
