It’s Official – The Single Best Place to Live in 2010
Read the original article published by International Living here.
Where in the world can you enjoy the best quality of life?
Now, we’re value hounds here at IL. But each January we rate the single best place to live purely from a quality of life perspective.
We don’t take value out of the equation entirely. We simply make less of it.
Answering this question is never easy…
Before we pick a winner, IL’s far flung staff of writers and international team of experts examine 194 countries and crunch the numbers under nine categories: Cost of Living, Culture and Leisure, Economy, Environment, Freedom, Health, Infrastructure, Safety and Risk, and Climate.
The process takes three months…and costs us tens of thousands of dollars.
Why do we spend the time and money on trying to find the world’s best quality of life destination? Because it’s in our blood. It’s what we’ve been doing for the last 30 years.
Here are some of the highlights from this year’s Quality of Life Index top ten:
New Zealand comes in this year as the fifth best place to live. The country’s immigration department sums up the attractions perfectly:
“In many ways it’s not what we have that’s important to our quality of life—it’s what we don’t have. We don’t have high crime rates, our police don’t carry guns and instances of corruption are virtually unheard of. We don’t have abject poverty or hunger and we don’t have the pollution, congestion, health issues and cramped city living that we see elsewhere.”
We ranked Italy the tenth best place to live this year. It’s not difficult to see why.
You’ve got Rome, Venice, Florence—some of the world’s most beautiful cities. Throw in 60% of the world’s art treasures…a national health care system rated second in the world…sunflowers…vineyards…the world’s best espresso…ice cream…pasta…and pizza…and you’ve got a potent mix.
Neither New Zealand nor Italy come close to this year’s winner for hands down quality of life. In fact, we sure that nobody…nowhere…does quality of life quite like this year’s winner. And at surprisingly reasonable prices…
Let me give you some examples.
– A bottle of some of the world’s best rosé wine: $4.12
– Half a pound of homemade garlic sausage: $1.60
– A visit to your general practitioner: $30
– A monthly premium for private health care (ranked the best in the world): $125
– A four-bedroom stone farmhouse with outbuildings and a large garden: $186,000
Of course, the prices tell only a small part of the story. The real allure of this year’s Quality of Life Index winner is its unparalleled mixture of culture, gastronomy and honest to goodness joie de vivre.
This is what IL writer Steenie Harvey has to say about the place: “This year’s winner’s sensual allure leaves nobody untouched. Spend even a few months here and you will never again regard life in quite the same way. For me, it was love at first sight. I can’t get enough of its culture, fashion, stunning architecture, and intoxicating history. As for the food and wine—well, even thinking about it makes me salivate.”
You can learn everything you need to know about this country that offers you the world’s best quality of life…and get the ratings and rankings in every category for every other country in our 2010 Quality of Life Index…out now for subscribers to International Living magazine.