Vienna Ranks Poorly Among Expats
The Expat City Ranking has ranked 50 cities worldwide in the year 2022. There have been some surprises; however, Vienna did not do well in the ranking, with some complaints repeating themselves even from the years before. The expats rank the cities on an annual basis through some basic categories. Vienna has one category where it performed the worst.
The Expat City Ranking has ranked Vienna as a rude city. / Picture: © Wikimedia Commons; Ogre, CC BY 3.0
Vienna as a city has a lot of advantages and disadvantages, as it is shown in this year’s Expat City Ranking. Austria’s capital ranks 27th out of 50 cities, which displays a drop of 13 places considering last year when the city was ranked 14th. The city’s biggest disadvantage is undoubtedly the category of ease of settling in, where it ranked last of all 50 cities. Even in the category of quality of life, it was ranked 7th, whereas last year it ranked first place. This year, only in the category of transport and travel, Vienna topped the list and in the area of health, it was ranked second.
In the index for working abroad, Vienna ranks 26th out of 50 cities. 68 percent of expats rate their job as secure and two-thirds rate their work-life balance positively - compared to 59 percent and 62 percent globally. However, 23 percent of those surveyed are dissatisfied with their career opportunities, and a third find that the corporate culture in Vienna lacks creativity and unconventional thinking, according to Der Standard.
Der Standard further states, however, the acclimatization index is the biggest minus point. Here, Vienna is considered the worst city in the world and also takes last place in the "friendliness" category. Expats describe people in Vienna as unfriendly in general (43 percent vs. 17 percent globally) and towards the foreign population in particular (46 percent vs. 18 percent globally). In addition, more than half of those surveyed find it difficult to make friends with the Viennese.