Free Republic

FOR THE second year running living conditions have not improved in cities around the world, according to the latest liveability index from EIU, our sister company. The annual survey, designed to help companies calculate hardship allowances when they relocate staff, rates 173 cities across five categories: health care, culture and environment, education, infrastructure and stability. While scores in the first four categories have mostly remained constant or improved, gains have been offset by declines in stability. Vienna is a case in point. The Austrian capital was the world’s most liveable city from 2022 to 2024. But this year it lost...

Every year, The Economist ranks cities around the world on livability, based on factors including crime and conflict to public transportation and education.This map, via Visual Capitalist's Kayla Zhu, shows the 10 most livable cities in the world, according to The Economist Intelligence Unit’s Global Liveability Index 2025.The index ranks cities on over 30 factors across five categories to determine their overall livability. Factors include:Stability: Prevalence of crime, terror, military conflict, civil unrest/conflictHealthcare: Availability and quality of private and public healthcare, general healthcare indicatorsCulture and environment: Humidity/temperature rating, cultural and sporting availability, social or religious restrictionsEducation: Availability and quality of...

Living conditions in cities across the world have fully recovered from the deterioration caused by the covid-19 pandemic, EIU’s latest liveability index shows. It rates living conditions in 173 cities across five categories: stability, health care, culture and environment, education and infrastructure. Cities in the Asia-Pacific region have rebounded the most. The index also suggests that life in cities is a bit better than at any time in the past 15 years. Our charts below show which cities topped the ranking. The liveability survey was designed to help companies calculate hardship allowances for staff who were moving to a new—and...

Raising a healthy, stable family sometimes requires moving to a new state. The reasons people choose to move are often similar: career transitions, better schools, financial challenges or a general desire to change settings. Wants and needs don’t always align in a particular state, though. For instance, a state might offer a low income-tax rate but have a subpar education system. However, families do not necessarily need to make these kinds of tradeoffs. They can avoid such problems by knowing which states offer the best combination of qualities that matter most to parents and their kids. The ideal city is...

Money Magazine recently released its list of the best places to live in the U.S. It is riddled with pompous virtue-signaling and plagued by diversity-induced myopia that skews rankings to fit a progressive, multicultural agenda. Indeed, the magazine admits that it "gave preference toward places with populations that were less than 80% white." Many places probably are, but why propagate such bias instead of applying the criteria (education, jobs, housing, quality of life, etc.) objectively? Instead, in the descriptive justifications for each ranking, Money Magazine touts diversity and multiculturalism. That emphasis results in high "best place" rankings for places with...

Pandemic restrictions changed the livability of many urban centers worldwide as cultural sites were shuttered, restaurant dining was restricted, and local economies faced the consequences. But as cities worldwide return to the status quo, many of these urban centers have become desirable places to live yet again.As Visual Capitalist's Avery Koop notes, this map uses annual rankings from the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) to show the world’s most livable cities, measuring different categories including: stability, healthcare, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure.A Quick Note on MethodologyThe ranking attempts to assess which cities across the globe provide the best living conditions,...

In an earlier article, I mentioned that lists ranking the "top" or "best" countries in the world are all over the web. Well, a friend sent me one today. It was produced by Condé Nast Traveler and is typical of the genre.This is their list:1. Norway 2. Australia/Switzerland (tie) (Due to the tie for number 2, there is no number 3) 4. Germany 5. Denmark/Singapore (tie) (No number 6) 7. The Netherlands 8. Ireland 9. Iceland 10. Canada/The United States (tie)Curious about how they arrived at this ranking, I decided to look more closely at their criteria. The list is based...