The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) has released its list of more livable cities, and for the second year in a row Vienna has taken the top spot. The Austrian city had a near perfect score of 99.1 percent.
The 140 cities were ranked based on stability, health care, culture and environment, education, and infrastructure. Vienna earned nearly perfect scores in all categories. It was followed by Melbourne and Sydney, Australia; Osaka, Japan; and Calgary, Canada. Melbourne previously held the number one spot for seven consecutive years before it was unseated by Vienna in 2018.
The cities that fill out the top 10 remain the same as last year, although some of the positions have changed. EIU notes that medium-sized cities in wealthy countries tend to do well in the rankings.
Honolulu was the highest rated city in the United States, with Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Chicago all making it into the top 50.
Major financial hubs did not fare all that well on the list. London came in at 48. New York City is number 58. While New York was ranked highly for culture, it lost points for infrastructure and stability.
The least livable city in the world is Damascus, Syria, followed by Lagos, Nigeria; Dhaka, Bangladesh; Tripoli, Libya; and Karachi, Pakistan.
Twitter, of course, had some priceless reactions to the news.
The chief suspect in the disappearance of Natalee Holloway has admitted he beat the young Alabama woman to death on a beach in Aruba after she refused his advances. New details in the killing emerged Wednesday as Joran Van der Sloot pleaded guilty to extorting Holloway's mother, resolving a case that has captivated the public’s attention for nearly 20 years.
The trial of a Fugees rapper, who was convicted this year in multimillion-dollar political conspiracies, stretched across the worlds of politics and entertainment — and now the case is touching on the tech world with arguments that his defense attorney bungled the case, in part, by using an artificial intelligence program to write his closing arguments.
Israel said Wednesday that it will allow Egypt to deliver limited quantities of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip, the first crack in a 10-day siege on the territory. Palestinians reeled from a massive blast at a Gaza City hospital that killed hundreds the day before and grew increasingly desperate as food and water supplies ran out.
A 4000-year-old slab of rock is being dubbed a treasure map for archaeologists. The rock was found in 1900 at the site of an ancient tomb in northwestern France and it was declared Europe's oldest known map in 2021.
Hundreds of people gathered for a vigil honoring a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy who was stabbed to death over the weekend by his family's landlord in an apparent hate crime.
