Timesの記事；
瑞西の銀行UBSの調査によれば、世界で生活コストの高い都市ベスト（ワースト？）５は、倫敦、オスロ、コペンハーゲン、東京、香港。UBSのプレス・リリースはhttp://www.ubs.com/1/e/media_overview/media_global/mediareleases?newsId=59083なり。なお、今回東京はオスロに抜かれたが、これは”the deflationary trend in Japan”とともに、”the appreciation of the Norwegian krone”に帰せられる。
London: the world's most expensive City
By Rhys Blakely
Londoners would probably suspect as much – factor in the cost of housing, and their city is the most expensive in the world.
Even after property costs are stripped out, London trails only Oslo as the dearest place to call home, leading Copenhagen, Zurich and Tokyo in the top five, according to a report published today by UBS, the Swiss bank.
Earnings in London also figured among the world’s highest – coming in at No6 with average hourly earnings of $20.30 (£10.60). Wages were highest in Copenhagen, where the average was $26.90 an hour.
However, high taxes and social security charges mean Denmark's capital loses ground in terms of net wages. "The shooting star" in that table was "English speaking Europe", UBS said, with London and Dublin entering the top ten for the first time
After accounting for life's necessities, workers in Zurich, Geneva, Dublin, Los Angeles and Luxembourg retain the highest portion of net wages for discretionary spending on holidays, luxuries and savings.
At the foot of the rankings, the basket of 122 goods and services on which the study is based costs least in Kuala Lumpar, Mumbai, Delhi and Buenos Aries.
However, the study's authors argue that wages only become meaningful in terms of what can be bought with money earned. To work that out, they studied the global costs of a Big Mac in terms of how long it takes to earn the money to buy one.
On a global average, it takes 35 minutes of work to buy one of the burgers, but the disparities are huge. In Nairobi it takes one and a half hours while in the US a maximum of 13 minutes. In London, it takes 16 minutes.
Workers in Paris put in the least amount of time in the workplace, at an average of 1,480 hours. Based on a eight-and-a-half hour working day, Parisians spend 50 days less a year working than their Asian peers.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,16849-2305663,00.html
ところで、６月末には、Mercer Consultingの調査が公表されて、それによると、モスクワが東京を抜いたということだったのだ*1。
