Is France the Best Place in the World to Live?

A new survey from International Living says that France has the highest quality of life, followed by Australia and Switzerland. The United States, meanwhile, is in seventh place, behind nations such as Germany, New Zealand, and Luxembourg:

To produce this annual Index we consider nine categories: Cost of Living, Culture and Leisure, Economy, Environment, Freedom, Health, Infrastructure, Safety and Risk, and Climate. This involves a lot of number crunching from "official" sources, including government websites, the World Health Organization, and The Economist, to name but a few. We also take into account what our editors from all over the world have to say about our findings.

1. FRANCE
2. AUSTRALIA
3. SWITZERLAND
4. GERMANY
5. NEW ZEALAND
6. LUXEMBOURG
7. UNITED STATES
8. BELGIUM
9. CANADA
10. ITALY

While I enjoy hammering French socialists, this does not mean I disagree with the list. International Living's Index basically measures good places to live for people who already have money. France is a very nice country to visit, and would be a very nice place for a rich person to live depending on one's preferences for food, weather, and culture. Personally, I'd go for someplace warm and sunny, such as the Cayman Islands (which only ranks 54th out of 194 options). There are plenty of interesting details in the comprehensive table, including Liechtenstein being the only place to get a perfect score in the economy category. Somalia was the worst overall country. The biggest surprise, at least to me, is that Singapore was ranked 70th. Seems rather low since a number of rich people are choosing to become Singapore residents.