Job Discussion Forums

Veron · Joined: 27 Dec 2004 Posts: 6

Folks might be interested to know that at last up-to-date living costs around the world are now available free of charge online! Tefl.com launched their "City Cost Guide" last week. Covering most of the major cities in 50 odd countries, the data includes prices for accommodation, food, clothes, utilities etc. in 4 currencies. A really handy source for trying to get to grips with those overseas salaries. It can be accessed at http://www.tefl.com.

Peter

Stephen Jones · Joined: 21 Feb 2003 Posts: 4124

The main problem it suffers from is that it gives one price instead of a range of prices. Whilst that may be Ok for consumer goods it is a problem for accomodation.. The result is that someone from one city can put in the bottom price, and somebody from another city can put in the top price, and the two cities in the same country seem to have a 200% difference in prices when the difference is often nearer 40-50%. This is certainly true of the prices for accomodation in Jeddah and Riyadh.

ls650 · Joined: 10 May 2003 Posts: 3484 Location: British Columbia

Stephen Jones · Joined: 21 Feb 2003 Posts: 4124

I am sure there must be better guides, though not necessarily in one place. We can probably improve it by sending in our own information, so it doesn't depend too much on one individual's assessment for each city.

comenius · Posted: Sun Oct 23, 2005 3:27 pm Post subject:

The Economist publishes their "Big Mac" index every year, which uses the relative cost of a Big Mac in countries around the world as a relative barometer of their cost of living (technically, purchasing power parity). It doesn't break it down to the city level, but it's a pretty good general guide of how different countries compare. I've linked it below in case anyone is interested... Smile

http://www.economist.com/markets/Bigmac/Index.cfm

Kent F. Kruhoeffer · Joined: 22 Jan 2003 Posts: 2129 Location: 中国

^ Thanks Veron

& comenius too !

luv the Big Mac Index ...

and the Big Macs themselves.

Thailand came in down near the bottom,

which is where I expected it to be.

In your honour (and with due credit, thanks!)

I've just added the Big Mac Index to the cost-of-living index

located in Appendix A of the Master Index Thailand.

You'll notice I had already listed the 'set lunch' price. Laughing

Veron · Joined: 27 Dec 2004 Posts: 6

I've heard back from the folks at tefl.com. With regard to accom they may add both "bottom price" and "top price" data in a future upgrade. At present the costs go for the median. They also say that they've received some helpful feedback from visitors and hope to incorporate these suggestions in future upgrades. You can feedback yourself at [email protected]. By the way, while I think the big mac data is interesting, it really doesn't really help a teacher much in calculating how far their salary will go in the real world.. just my tuppence worth Smile