Berlin is getting more expensive

[imomus]

According to figures released by Mercer, Berlin has shot up the list of the World's Most Costly Cities. In 2006 it was at 75 in Mercer's league table, nice and cheap. Just a year later, however, we find the city at 42. If it maintains that trajectory -- climbing another 33 places in the next year -- Berlin will be in the world's Top 10 most expensive cities.

That's not going to happen, of course; the big leap from 75 to 42 is the result of the strength of the euro. Mercer's table is designed to guide international companies on the kind of pay they need to offer their staff when they go expat. It measures the comparative cost of a basket of 200 expenses -- including housing, transport and clothing -- in each city, but it's particularly sensitive to currency fluctuations. I'm happy to say my rent hasn't doubled, though the dollars I used to earn with my Wired column just got lighter and lighter as the euro strengthened.



The world's most expensive city this year (as last year) is Moscow. London is at number two, followed by Seoul, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Copenhagen, Geneva, Osaka, Zurich and Oslo. There are no American cities in the Top 10; New York has slipped to 15.

Japanese cities are getting cheaper. So are Chinese ones, because the value of the Chinese Yuan has decreased against the euro. There are also low inflation rates and stable property rental prices in China. Seoul is, rather surprisingly, more expensive to live in than Tokyo.

Five African cities are among the world's 50 most expensive, and are climbing the table year-on-year: Douala in Cameroon is at 24, Dakar in Senegal at 33, Abidjan in Cote d'Ivoire at 35. Lagos is at 37 but getting cheaper, and Algiers just scrapes in at 50.

Better mathematicians than I am could get a series of precise value-for-money coefficients by comparing Mercer's cost of living stats with its quality of living table, based on assessments of each city's stability, crime, economics, health, education, public services and transportation, recreation, consumer goods, housing, and natural environment. Here, Berlin is doing well -- it's holding steady as the 16th best city in the world to live in. The considerably more expensive London is, for quality of life, down at 39. Tokyo is at 35 and Paris at 33. Moscow, the world's most expensive city, is nowhere to be seen in the quality of life Top 50.

Since I'm blinding you with urbanist science today, I thought I'd add some facts about city densities I scribbled down the other day from a book I was browsing at ProQM. These density figures are based on the number of dwellings occupying 100 x 100 metres of land (one hectare).

Los Angeles has a density of 15 dwellings per hectare.
25 is the density at which a bus service becomes economically viable.
London has a density of 42.
60 is the density at which a tram service becomes economically viable.
The average density of consolidated urban areas in Europe is 93.
Town planners often set 100 as the ideal urban density.
In the 1970s Singapore had a density of 250.
Parts of Kowloon today have a density of 1250.

Sleep tight!

Comments

[17x17.livejournal.com]

Yes, welcome to Moscow. There are lot of places where you can spend your money for goods cheaper everywhere except Russia.

[(Anonymous)]

I thought a lot of real estate and such was black market in Moscow. How are they able to get an accurate measure of the costs?

[desant012.livejournal.com]

I've gotta say, these days in New York I've had a lot of fun practicing my German, especially around my neighborhood in Brooklyn.

There are tonnnnns of people here from England and Ireland who have recently moved into the new condos going up. It's cute to hear some English girl in a Brooklyn pizzeria talk about her first day living here.

This is like a weird kind-of new immigration ... affluent Europeans instead of those crazy downtrodden folk--they're all going where I grew up in New Jersey.

[(Anonymous)]

I wouldn't bank on Berlin being cheap for too much longer, though. It is, after all, the capital of one of the world's largest economies, and one that has started growing again. The historical anomalies which have made it cheap will get smoothed out sooner rather than later. Look what happened to Prague.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

The most shocking thing about Moscow is the coefficient between expensiveness and quality of life. It's number one in the expensiveness table, nowhere to be seen in the quality of life Top 50.

[(Anonymous)]

You're right. Prog dropped off after the late 70s, but saw a revival in some of Momus' work in the late 90s.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Are you saying there's a link between prog's stock, Momus' presence in a city, and cost of living in that city? I want to see the bar graphs, please!

[ex-newironsh15.livejournal.com]

which urbanism book was that?

[kumakouji.livejournal.com]

What a surprise, Londoners are being bled dry. I could have told you that without looking at any charts.

[kumakouji.livejournal.com]

Why do you think that is? Do you think cost of living being so disproportionate to quality of life is all about poor management choices by those in charge?

Doesnt say a lot for London...

[mme-furiosa.livejournal.com]

Brilliant! I'm fascinated by this stuff, right up in my wheelhouse.

Sadly, having just visited London from NYC, it depressed me heartily to feel as though I was exchanging pesos for pounds. Living there was untenable 8 years ago, and it certainly doesn't seem to be getting any better.

I'm curious about the most rapidly emerging economies. The UAE is exploding. In a month spent there recently, I began to fantasize about living in a series of emerging cities, riding the trough of the wave and escaping right before they peak. Could be a stimulating anthropological experiment.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I didn't write down the title, but it contains the word "Density" in the title, and it's an oblong book with a green cover and fancy graphics... if that helps at all!

[(Anonymous)]

Oddly, my flatmate left Berlin because it was too cheap. Endless drinking, perma-tourist, hanging with artists who don't really art, just hang. The grind of London will sharpen wits and write his masterpiece. If it works - a new concept - Triple Tax For Creatives!

The Phantom NeoCon

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Leaving Berlin "because it's too cheap" sounds like a classic piece of post facto rationalization. What was the real reason your flatmate left, eh?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I just think we're trained by life in a consumer society to think that something very expensive must be very high quality. And there's no reason on earth why it should be so.

[(Anonymous)]

I'd say the sudden influx of guided pub crawls with 100s of drunk, not very well-behaving anglo saxons that pass my window every night is a sign that Berlin has gone Prague, and has very few months left on the coolness radar.

I think Munich is where it's at these days.

der.

[(Anonymous)]

I thought Munich was Germany's most expensive city? The last time I was there it was probably the cleanest, sharpest, most pristine area populated by people that I'd ever seen.

[(Anonymous)]

He claims it was simply being able to drink so much. London leaves no choice. Novel written (set in Berlin, maybe the exile thing), even working part time.

[setau.livejournal.com]

The other thing with Moscow is that the expat sector never really recovered from the mid-90s "rip them off for their whole spending account" syndrome, so you're point about Berlin is ever amplified.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Aha, because alcohol was too cheap, I see!

[(Anonymous)]

And maybe a case of "Don't cut off your feet to fit your rent, make your rent bigger instead."

[bongo-kong.livejournal.com]

You missed a fact from the Mercer site : the top five cities for quality of living in the Americas were all in Canada

Vancouver (3rd)
Toronto (15th)
Ottawa (tied for 18th)
Montreal (22nd)
Calgary (24th)

As a Scot you might also want to know that Glasgow made the Top 50 for quality of life but no other UK city managed it.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Well, there's something to that. Up to a point. But it only applies to people who don't have the inner gumption to do things unless money and sheer necessity force them.

I think a cheap city is rather like an empty afternoon. You know, you always hear dull actors saying in interviews "I was glad to get the call to appear in the film, because I'm not very happy just sitting home watching daytime TV." That really says a lot more about their own lack of inner resourcefulness than anything else. It explains why they're actors and not writers... or is explained by it.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Wow, those are rather amazing facts, and I did indeed miss a trick leaving them out!

I can only assume that Edinburgh lost out to its old rival because braying welly-booted students and New Town advocates who send their sons to Heriot's were held against it.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

I'll go with that. Was in Munich for the first time last week and loved it.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

Edinburgh dropped off the list when they heard that some Edinburgers consider Heriot's a posh school ;-)

http://www.tour-eiffel.fr/teiffel/uk/

[pay-option07.livejournal.com]

Luv the Deli festival pics,must've been fun!

Couple weeks ago I was reading the business news about why GM, Toyota, and other Corp. where building factories infinitum
in St Petersberg. I figured eastern Europe would have been a better bet for location, but the paper stated the average salary in USSR is about $580.00 US compared to the $890.00 in
eastern Europe. At $580.00 a month anywhere would be expensive!

I'm curious about the most rapidly emerging economies

[pay-option07.livejournal.com]

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/print/eo20070515a1.html

[onigaishimas.livejournal.com]

Moscow is so inappropriately expensive because everything is being imported. A chain of seafood restaurants advertises with "our fish flies first class" slogan. Plus goods there don't NEED to be affordable - there is of middle class - things are either cheap and basic (subway ride is way below $1), or super-expensive and marketed as V.I.P. (Russian stand-in for 'luxury').

[imomus.livejournal.com]

What you're describing is a classic Evil Gini (http://imomus.livejournal.com/113269.html) society. Perhaps someone will invent communism soon!

[nato-dakke.livejournal.com]

come on now, if cities like ottowa rank above tokyo on quality of living, then the quality of living seems to be very poor at quantizing "fun". But I'm sure they got a good count of trees, shopping malls and golf courses.

[mcgazz.livejournal.com]

I imagine women don't get groped on public transport as a matter of course in Ottawa.

One does wonder, though, how they calculate "quality of living". Personally, a town guaranteed free of golf courses (and therefore golf clubs) would suit me fine.

[bonsai-human.livejournal.com]

I love how New Zealand and Australia are suddenly in Asia (though from the faces on the streets of Auckland you'd probably guess it was). That our cities make up the top five in the Asian quality of life survey is a bit of an indictment on true Asian cities.

Apparently I live in the city with the 5th highest quality of life in the world. I wouldn't doubt it, if we a) had a public transport system and b) didn't have a massive poverty stricken mainly indigenous underclass. For a white middle class type like myself, yes, life is insanely easy here. But in line with The Phantom NeoCon's flatmate's thinking, I wonder if maybe this isn't such a good thing.

[bonsai-human.livejournal.com]

Sorry to burst your bubble, but Glasgow made the top 50 in the "Worldwide Health and Sanitation Ranking", not the "Worldwide Quality of Living Survey".

London was the only UK city to make it in the top 50 of the latter.

[ex-newironsh15.livejournal.com]

are there women in ottawa?

[ex-newironsh15.livejournal.com]

comme celui-ci?

http://www.amazon.com/DENSITY-CONDENSED-Javier-Mozas/dp/8461112032/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-8693071-8284820?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1187551551&sr=1-1

[imomus.livejournal.com]

THAT'S THE ONE!

Interesting joke!

[(Anonymous)]

Three young boys were fighting over whose dad was the best.
"My dad is so good he can shoot an arrow, run after it, get in front of it, and catch it in his bare hands."
"My dad is so good that he can shoot a gun, run after the bullet, get in front of it and catch it in his bare hands."
"I've got you both beat. My dad's so good because he works for the city. He gets off work at 5:00 and is home by 4:30."


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