Moroccan Cities Rank Among World’s Most Affordable for Western Expats, Survey Finds

According to this study carried out by the American human resources consulting firm Mercer, Casablanca has made a leap of 7 places, thus positioning itself in 114th place, while Rabat has climbed from 159th to 152nd place.

This survey, which serves as a barometer for multinationals and governments to define the compensation of their expatriate employees, measured this year the cost of more than 200 goods and services in each of the targeted cities. These include housing, transportation, food, clothing, household items, cultural and leisure activities, details Mercer. This year’s ranking includes 209 cities on five continents and considers New York as the reference city, and currency fluctuations are measured against the US dollar.

In the Maghreb, the two Moroccan cities are less expensive than those of Algiers (198th) and Tunis (206th), the most expensive in the region. The report notes that European and Southeast Asian cities have risen in 2021 in the ranking of the most expensive cities for expatriates, due to the weakness of the dollar. The capital of Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, which has few expatriates, moves from 2nd place last year to 1st due to high local inflation.

Hong Kong, 1st in the previous ranking, gives up a place due to the high cost of its housing, while Beirut, the Lebanese capital, plummets in the ranking from 45th last year to 3rd due to the inflation caused by the economic crisis following the explosions that partially destroyed the port on August 4, 2020, indicates Mercer in its press release.

The most expensive cities in the rest of the world are notably Tokyo (4th), Shanghai (6th), Singapore (7th), Beijing (9th), Zurich (5th), Geneva (8th) and Bern (10th). In the United States, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco top the ranking.