Within Central and South America, Nassau ranks as the most expensive location for international employees (number 10 globally), followed by San Juan (44) and Buenos Aires (45). Saudi cities such as Riyadh (85) and Jeddah (101) have also jumped up the global list, by 18 and 10 spots respectively. The next most expensive cities in this region are in the United Arab Emirates, namely Dubai (18) and Abu Dhabi (43), both of which have seen fairly significant increases in their rankings since last year. Tel Aviv remains the costliest city in the Middle East for international employees, ranked 8th on the global ranking. Other most expensive cities in the region include London, Vienna, Amsterdam, Prague (up 27 spots in the global ranking since last year) and Helsinki. The global top ten includes five European cities and four of those are in Switzerland, with the fifth being Copenhagen. The two least expensive locations in the world are also Asian cities - Karachi (226) and Islamabad (227). However, these cities top the ranking, with Hong Kong ranked first, followed by Singapore (2).

This year, only two out of 10 of the most expensive cities for international assignees to live in are located in Asia, compared to four last year.

Global cities ranking 2021