Cost of Living Index (Excl. Rent) is a relative indicator of consumer goods prices, including groceries, restaurants, transportation and utilities. Cost of Living Index does not include accommodation expenses such as rent or mortgage. If a city has a Cost of Living Index of 120, it means Numbeo has estimated it is 20% more expensive than New York (excluding rent).

Please refer further to: https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/cpi_explained.jsp for motivation and methodology.

All credits to https://www.numbeo.com .

This dataset would surely help socio-economic researchers to analyse and get deeper insights regarding the life of people country-wise.

Thanks to @andradaolteanu for the motivation! Upwards and onwards...

In 2024, Singapore's cost of living index was at ****, compared to that of New York City as a base of 100. This meant that Singapore was about ** percent more affordable than New York City. With a local purchasing power index of ***, residents with an average salary in Singapore are able to afford more goods and services compared to the base city of New York City. In that year, Singapore had the highest cost of living index in Asia.

In 2024, the CPI in U.S. cities averaged at 313.7. However, the CPI for the New York-Newark-Jersey City metropolitan area amounted to about 334.21. Prices in New York City were significantly higher than the U.S. average. Nonetheless, the San Diego-Carlsbad area ranked first with a CPI of 373.32.The monthly inflation rate for the United States can be found here.

170,2 (Index, higher means higher cost of living) in 2024Q3.

103,8 (Index, higher means higher cost of living) in 2024Q3.

The observation for 2020 is missing because the U.S. Census Bureau released experimental estimates (https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/data/experimental-data.html) instead of the standard 1-year data products for the 2020 American Community Survey (ACS). There was no 2020 experimental data provided for the American Community Survey (ACS) 1-year variable S1901_C01_013E.

Mean household income, American Community Survey (ACS) 1-year variable S1901_C01_013E, is adjusted by CPI (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CPIAUCSL) where the price index is re-based to 1999 dollars. Then the series is adjusted for cost of living using regional price parities (RPP) from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis' Real Personal Income for States and Metropolitan Areas (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/release?rid=403&soid=18). Finally to approximate the wage, the series is divided by (52 * 40), which assumes there are 52 weeks in a year and 40 work hours in a week. Note that household income can include additional sources of income beyond wages. See page 83 in the ACS's Subject Definitions (https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/tech_docs/subject_definitions/2019_ACSSubjectDefinitions.pdf) for more information.

ACS 1-year estimates are not available for all geographic areas. If a county is not included in the 1-year estimates for a given year, the series will not revise or there will be a missing observation. See the Areas Published (https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/acs/geography-acs/areas-published.html) for more details about the geographies included in the ACS 1-year estimates.

The RPP used to calculate this series is NYNMPRPPALL (https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/NYNMPRPPALL). If the RPP for the region is zero or missing for a given year, the series will not revise or there will be a missing observation.

At **** U.S. dollars, Switzerland has the most expensive Big Macs in the world, according to the January 2025 Big Mac index. Concurrently, the cost of a Big Mac was **** dollars in the U.S., and **** U.S. dollars in the Euro area. What is the Big Mac index? The Big Mac index, published by The Economist, is a novel way of measuring whether the market exchange rates for different countries’ currencies are overvalued or undervalued. It does this by measuring each currency against a common standard – the Big Mac hamburger sold by McDonald’s restaurants all over the world. Twice a year the Economist converts the average national price of a Big Mac into U.S. dollars using the exchange rate at that point in time. As a Big Mac is a completely standardized product across the world, the argument goes that it should have the same relative cost in every country. Differences in the cost of a Big Mac expressed as U.S. dollars therefore reflect differences in the purchasing power of each currency. Is the Big Mac index a good measure of purchasing power parity? Purchasing power parity (PPP) is the idea that items should cost the same in different countries, based on the exchange rate at that time. This relationship does not hold in practice. Factors like tax rates, wage regulations, whether components need to be imported, and the level of market competition all contribute to price variations between countries. The Big Mac index does measure this basic point – that one U.S. dollar can buy more in some countries than others. There are more accurate ways to measure differences in PPP though, which convert a larger range of products into their dollar price. Adjusting for PPP can have a massive effect on how we understand a country’s economy. The country with the largest GDP adjusted for PPP is China, but when looking at the unadjusted GDP of different countries, the U.S. has the largest economy.