New Zealand has been ranked by immigrants as the second-worst place in the world to move, according to a new survey.
During the pandemic, some New Zealand cities were rated the world’s most livable, and “moving to New Zealand” became a common catch-cry among Americans dissatisfied with their own country’s political outlook. Following the Brexit referendum vote there was a surge of interest in emigrating from the UK.
Now it seems our low wages and high cost of living is making New Zealand less desirable as a place to live and work abroad.
First place in the newly released 2022 Expat Insider survey went to Mexico, second to Indonesia and third to Taiwan as the overall top three best countries for expats to live and work abroad. Of the 52 countries surveyed, the expats rated New Zealand almost at the bottom (51st), saved from the ignominy of last place by Kuwait, which came last, and marginally better than Hong Kong which came 50th, as the third worst place to live and work.
The expatriate networking organisation InterNations surveyed nearly 12,000 respondents of 177 different nationalities, living in 181 countries. Respondents were asked how their new homes performed on factors including quality of life, cost of living, safety, financial outlook, bureaucracy, and ease of fitting in.
The views gathered in the survey paint a picture of what expat life today is like — and also give insights into expats’ respective countries of residence around the globe.
New Zealand’s strongest suit was the outdoors – environment and climate was the only metric on which New Zealand ranked in the top half of countries. Its natural environment was loved by 95% of those arriving, compare with 83% globally – and on opportunities for recreational sports it ranked 84%, versus 75% elsewhere.
Is New Zealand 100% pure rip-off? ask’s Auckland-based Tess McClure, reporting in the Guardian. Our country’s poor showing was attributed to lower wages and high cost of living, says McClure. New Zealand was the worst-performing country in the survey’s personal finance measure: 49% of respondents said their disposable household income was not enough to lead a comfortable life, compared with 28% globally. For general cost of living, 75% rated the country negatively, compared with 35% globally.
“New Zealand also ranked below global averages for respondents feeling fairly paid for their work, seeing a purpose in their work or liking their working hours”, she says.
InterNations was founded in 2007 and is reportedly the largest global expat network with 4.5 million members
