Spain Voted Best For Quality Of Life For 2022
Spain News
Published: 14 July 2022 14:45 CET
Spain has been voted the number one country for quality of life in the latest Internations Expat Insider report for 2022.
The Expat Insider has been run annually since 2014 and aims to measure how expats deal with the everyday obstacles associated with moving to a new country such as the language, safety, weather and bureaucracy.
To populate the survey, 11,970 expats were questioned, representing 177 nationalities and living in 181 countries worldwide.
Each respondent was asked a series of questions and rated up to 56 different factors to evaluate their experiences of living abroad.
For the destination to be included in the report, it needed a sample size of at least 50 participants. In the current report, 52 countries met these criteria.
So how did Spain do? Let’s take a look.
Spain rated #1 for quality of life
If your motive for moving to Spain is a better quality of life, which is on most of our agendas then Spain is the perfect destination for you.
In fact, out of the 52 countries, Spain finished in 1st place ahead of Taiwan, Austria and Portugal.
Putting that into context, some of the major European countries didn’t do so well. For example, the UK in comparison finished in 31st place, France was 11th and Germany finished 15th.
The Quality of Life index was split into five separate categories which were Leisure Options, Travel and Transit, Health and Wellbeing, Safety and Security and Environment and Climate.
Due to the great weather here, Spain once again finished in 1st place for Leisure Options with the editors stating that “no other place offered better leisure options”.
For Health and Wellbeing along with Environment and Climate Spain also did well coming in 7th place for both.
When it comes to Culture and Nightlife, over 85% of respondents said that Spain performed very well in this respect.
For the Travel and Transit category, Spain came in 8th, with one respondent from the U.S saying “I appreciate the easy availability of the beach, mountains, and airport!”
On a negative note, for Safety and Security, Spain didn’t do so well, finishing in 17th place out of the 52 countries.
However, this wasn’t based on personal safety as 90% of respondents said that they were happy and felt safe in Spain. Rather, the 17th place was based on Safety and Security due to the country’s below-average results for political stability where it was placed in a lowly 31st position.
Overall though, Spain did brilliantly in the Quality of Life index taking the top spot.
Settling in shouldn’t be an issue
It’s never easy moving to a new country. For many, moving to another country can feel like a real culture shock at first.
Fortunately, that didn’t seem to be an issue for the majority of respondents when it came to the ‘Settling In’ category with Spain finishing 10th out of 52 countries in how easy it is to find your feet.
Work opportunities are not so easy to come by
One category that Spain didn’t perform well in was ‘Working Abroad’ which contained five separate subcategories.
Spain actually finished a lowly 37 out of 52 here scoring badly for Career Prospects (41), Work and Leisure (21), Salary and Job Security (35) and Work Culture and Satisfaction (35).
Something to work on Mr Sanchez!
A little bit of work is required in terms of Expat Essentials
One category where Spain formed quite well but could do better was Expat Essentials which incorporates Digital Life, Admin Topics, Housing and Language.
Overall, Spain finished in 14th spot.
In the individual categories, Spain finished 21st for Digital Life, 33rd for Admin Topics (no surprise there), 16th for Housing and 18th for Language.
Spain finishes 5th overall
If you needed any more proof that Spain is rated as one of the top destinations in the world for expats to relocate then here it is.
Spain finished 5th overall out of the 52 countries.
Image Credit: Internations
In terms of the top level categories, Spain finished 1st in the Quality of Life category, 10th for Ease of Settling In, 11th for Personal Finance, 14th for Expat Essentials, but a lowly 37th for Working Abroad.
It really does confirm that although Spain doesn’t score highly in every category, overall, it is one of the best destinations for those seeking a better quality of life.
Overall, Spain was awarded a happiness score of 83%.
How did the UK do?
We all know that many of those who relocate to Spain are from the UK with Statista reporting that there were 313,975 Brits living in Spain in 2021.
Based on the latest Expat Insider report, it’s easy to see why so many Brits look to relocate to Spain.
The UK finished 37th out of the 52 countries finishing really low down in a number of categories including the High Cost of Living (50), Ease of Settling In (36), Quality of Life (31), Expat Essentials (17) and Working Abroad (15).
Overall, respondents gave the UK a score of 67% for overall happiness.
Source
You can read the full Expat Insider report for 2022 at the following address.
https://cms-internationsgmbh.netdna-ssl.com/cdn/file/cms-media/public/2022-07/Expat-Insider-2022.pdf
