The Economist released their most liveable cities in the world list this week, with Australia and Canada dominating the rankings. Now, while I do think Canadian cities are more liveable than most American cities, its interesting that you get such a diverse mix. Toronto is nothing like Calgary, and neither is anything like Vancouver (nor do I consider Vancouver very liveable). http://m.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/vancouver-toronto-rank-among-top-five-most-livable-cities-in-new-poll/article20106371/?service=mobile My review of the Canadian cities: Vancouver - Beautiful, but expensive and the least economic opportunity out of the Canadian cities. People are weird. Housing costs are prohibitive in the city and commuting in is insanity. Toronto - Worlds most diverse city, lots to do, easy to fit in no matter what you’re like. Insanely tolerant, almost to a fault. Infrastructure is stretched, but relatively effective transit. Decent economic opportunity in finance. Housing is slightly expensive but affordable in context of the city size and economy. Calgary - Smaller city (1.2million) so less culture, but developing. More diverse than many outsiders think. 10% of the population is American ex-pats (primarily from Montana, Idaho, Utah, Texas, etc) so there is a U.S. conservative type vibe here, especially in business. Lots of US oil company influence. Calgary is a car centric city, very US style, but roads infrastructure is reasonable. Housing is borderline affordable but getting more expensive. Economic opportunity is huge, big salaries and lots of jobs. Taxes are lower than most American states. I’ve lived in two of the above. That said, I am surprised about the lack of US cities on the list. Violence/crime, lack of public health weigh, but there are still attractive qualities to living in the US. Cities like San Diego come to mind for me, and I can appreciate those that like places like Seattle, Boston or others. So I’m wondering if there isn’t some anti-American bias in these rankings. What makes a city liveable to you? Is where you’re at liveable? What are some of the most liveable cities you’ve been to?
I’m visiting Vancouver next year for a wedding, then hopping on a train to Seattle and driving down the west coast for 4 weeks and into Vegas, can’t wait.
A big factor for me is job/career/business opportunities and ease of finding awesome things to do in my downtime. I’d hate to be a farmer in some backwater town in the middle of nowhere.
I would rather move to Damascus than Calgary…
^ Have you been?
Looking at this made me check out job opps in Canadian cities to see what’s up. I came across the below. Is this right? If so, I’m all over it. Living near Vancouver on a $35k/month USD contract (up front, no backloaded bonus)? For what looks like a pretty run of the mill position?
Investment Analyst
JIACHENG OVERSEAS IMMIGRATION AND EDUCATION SERVICE CORP
Posted: July 24, 2014
Expiring: September 30, 2014
Last Updated: July 24, 2014
Salary: $30,000.00 - $45,000.00/Monthly
Job Type: Full-Time, Permanent
Language: English
Start Date of Employment (Approx.): October 01, 2014
Minimum Education: Bachelor’s Degree
Positions Available: 1
NOC Group: Financial and Investment Analysts (1112)
NOC Job Title: Investment Analyst
Job Number: 160145
Job Location(s) BURNABY, British Columbia Job Description
About JCOS Consulting
JCOS Consulting, a subsidiary of JCOS group, is one of the very few consulting firms that are actively engaged in BC PNP (Business Stream), which is known as the most difficult Canadian immigration program as it fully combines immigration process with business acquisition or business start-up. (www.jcos.ca)
About JCOS Group
Services provided by JCOS’ subsidiaries include immigration consulting, education consulting, and business consulting. Our mission is to provide honest and reliable advice to our clients. We and our predecessor have been in practice for more than a decade now and we are highly recognized in the industry. Staff of the company includes licensed immigration consultants (ICCRC), Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), Certified Public Accountant (CPA), and most of our staff are young professionals educated in Canadian universities. The company headquarter is in Vancouver, but employees might travel domestically and internationally, and sometimes work from our Beijing office.
About the position
We are recruiting at the level of JCOS Consulting, for the position of Investment Analyst. Analyst is a key member of JCOS Consulting, a firm values professional skills. This position requires an analytical individual who has a keen interest in finance or business issues in general. This position is responsible for drafting business plans and conducting financial analysis, valuation and etc. In a young and professional environment, the expectation to this role is high and the potential is great.
^ I doubt that is right. Salaries in Canada are comparable to the US, maybe a bit higher (but it buys slightly less with PPP).
I spent quite a bit of time in Canada last summer and I must say it is a wonderful country. The United States is a third world country compared to Canada. I was shocked at how everything was so clean.
I think that job listing means $30k-$45k OR monthly.
So US cities are not in the top 10 most liveable? Ok, I believe that. The thing is that cities here tend to specialize in certain things. That is, live in New York to accumulate wealth, then move to Arizona to retire. Few cities here have a good balance. Maybe it’s because the country is big, and this promotes polarization of city purpose.
^ Robert: That’s because you visited in summer. Come by western Canada is February and you’ll see why its clean. Snow blown at 60mph across a surface has a scouring effect. 
My guess would be the variables used to come up with the rankings favor more homogenous cities. Many major U.S. cities are extremely segregated but still constitute one city. For example, Kansas City is gigantic in terms of land area and the northeastern part of the city looks and feels nothing like the southwestern. One is extremely dangerous with horrible schools and the other is as safe as anywhere in Canada with nice schools. But, if you have to combine everything for the sake of some survey like this, then KC looks bad on the whole.
An even more extreme example would be Chicago. I think Chicago is probably the coolest city in America and one of the few places I’d move to. You can live in Chicago and be nowhere near the war zone that is the area around the United Center.
America is a huge, strange, and diverse place; even within city boundaries. We’ll just never do well in these types of surveys. (How America ranks out in educational testing is another wildly misleading stat.)
For me, a city needs a few basic things.
-Fairly pleasant year round weather
-Stuff to do
-High salaries relative to COL and taxes (preferably both high pay and low COL and taxes)
I don’t pay much attention to the rankings that include things like resident health, crime, etc. because within cities there are typically pockets that are perfectly fine. I don’t really care about schools, hospitals, etc. since I’m single and young.
Chicago ranks 19th in this regard. Atlanta is king of the hill.
http://www.bloomberg.com/visual-data/best-and-worst/most-income-inequality-us-cities
I have been to western Canada in February and quite frankly the weather does suck but Canada is still has better cities than the United States.
I would argue Toronto is not homogeneous at all and is still a highly ranked city. Ethnically its more diverse than anywhere on Earth. And there are certainly pockets that are quite sketchy versus pockets that are amazing places to live. And if you’ve ever been to East Hastings in Vancouver, you’ll know that Vancouver has some real dark elements too (Vancouver too is very diverse). Calgary is a pretty homogeneous city. It is safe in all areas any time of day… Worst thing is you might get hasseled by a homeless guy looking for change.
These surveys have pretty much always been dominated by Canadian and Australian cities for the past 2-3 years with a couple of European cities thrown in like Vienna.
Good question. I suppose for most people it would be the factors quantified in that study - a good public school system etc etc but if you start filtering for ‘middle class’, a whole host of other cities that would never make that list emerge. You don’t have to be part of the ‘elite’ but above a certain threshhold of disposable income most families in the ‘third world’ send their kids to private school and have access to private healthcare and their number is growing in size as we speak. Assuming you belong to this segment a few interesting cities would be :
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Beirut - Did you know in Beirut there are nightclubs that served as bomb bunkers during the war? I mean how fkng cool is that?
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Cape Town - It has an edge to it but it is absolutely stunning in view, landscape and weather
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Lagos - This will be controversial, even some Nigerians might disagree with me but that city is awesome. I had to keep going there when summer vacation was on because family was there and I loved it. Chicken Satay on the beaches, sailing in their yatch clubs and a few other things. I once saw a dead body on the road due to ethnic riots and everyone just carried on as if it were normal. The term ‘joie de vivre’ might have come from France but it was made for the Nigerians. Shame what Boko Haram is doing to that country.
I suspect a lot of other cities like Santiago and Sao Paolo might come in but I’ve never been. The world sure is a big bad place and as someone correctly said ‘It continues to become flat’. The possibilities are endless.
I don’t think it is a stretch to say that one of the basic reasons there are not more US cities on the list is the amount of gun violence.
Wow, i’m impressed. I haven’t been back since 2004 but I hear things have changed drastically, if you have money, you can seriously enjoy yourself. My cousin quit Morgan Stanley to go work in Lagos 4 years ago and has not come back, must be a reason why. Agreed about Boko Haram.
The only reason Toronto is so high is because it’s a welcoming place. Every foreigner and their mother lands in Toronto.
But let’s look at the real Toronto. The infrastructure is falling apart, horrible public transportation, some of the worst traffic in North America, some of the worst drivers in Canada, too many no go zones due to crime and overpriced real estate.
no way it should be ranked the 4th most liveable city in the world.
And somehow you’ve managed to do that without the crime and poor schooling that seem to accompany it.
Must be a correlation =/= causation thing. (That was sacasm for those that didn’t pick up on it yesterday.)
I consulted in Charlotte, NC for 16 months and loved it, primarily because it was so easy to get out of the city and into the countryside.
I’d much rather be in a rural area than an urban one.