France has the best quality of life out of Europe's biggest countries, while Britain has the worst despite having the highest incomes, a study says.

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I'll put the link to the report from uswitch.com once I find it

Having lived in both countries let me tell you, don't get to carried away here. I'm a Brit but, not above seeing the limitation of Blighty, and I can say after 4 years of living in France I'm soooo glad I live here now. If I had to chose between France and the UK it's a no brainer the UK, things work, they don't eat garden pests, it doesn't close on Sunday, they don't have those horrid 1 cylinder cars driven by people with no license, and with the current weakness of the £ it is actually cheaper to live there to.

On the work/life expectancy, I'm not shocked the French live longer they do much less, I can't ever remember seeing a Frenchman sweat.... apart from when the local PMU threatend to close, or there is a potential for armed conflict, but never through any form of graft. As for the costs for fuel and food, I would guess that with £/€ exchange rate (cheers Mr Brown) that is no longer the case, and as for cigarettes should that really be a benchmark, and besides as the average Frenchman smokes old rope I don't think it really counts.

If you throw in the high costs of electricity & water, and the numerous local charges it's a different story, I just compared a UK council tax, water, and utility bills to my French equivalent and I had to use and exchange rate of 1.38 to get an equivalent payment per annum. Add in the cost of health care, and the overall higher taxes and social charges, and the cost of living in France gets worse.

The tax system is a joke and so complicated that many just don't declare in France, leading to huge deficits, and the only really thriving market is black (and that is a whole different story). The result being amongst others France's withdrawal of CPAM (health benefits) to non-French, below retirement age ex-pats, which all adds to the exodus from France. So, having tried both, 4 years ago France was cheaper, and generally provided a higher standard of living now that is definately not the case.

Britain is way cheaper than the continent right now.. that s correct
Even the chique Knightsbridge & Chelsea area of London compares favourably with the prices here.

However, as far as the job security is concerned, Britain is way worse. Latest crisis has shown, that when the outlook worsens, British companies do not hesitate to downsize

Public transport is cheaper in France than in the UK. It even becomes free when you have to walk to work because of a strike.

It wouldn't surprise me to be honest... i'm sad to say. Britain is generally fine if you have money, but for the average joe muggins living on minimum wage in the UK's council estates and trying to make ends meet, life must be hell compared to some other countries where even on a very low wage life can still be good.

I lived just outside Cognac, a fairly prosperous city. Go 20 minutes out (where we lived) and the average wage drops to €11,500 pa, and many people are on some form of benefit. However, due to the budget deficits many of these benefits are now repayable loans (the very generous child benefit is not) from the commune. It's bad enough that many of the locals have dug up gardens and drives to plant veg', I was approached in the summer by a guy who wanted to know if he could culitvate a buildng plot of land we have, and he would supply us veg in return.

In the main this is true, however TGV/fast train subsidies sap money from regional services so many small towns have lost or have a 2 train a day service. Buses intercity and in towns are generally good but this is at the expense of villages where there is no public transport whatsoever.

This in regards to France is distorted by the punitive effect of the law with regard to sacking/redundancy in France. Many companies just cannot let people go, as the payments they would have to make, exceed the cost of keeping the staff.

I am sure that you could selectively pick statistics or other factors to put any country at the top, or bottom of the list. This is such a subjective survey that it is almost meaningless.

Granted, all those surveys we quote (most liveable city???) depend totally on the set of variables measured.

That said, I have found the (artfully hidden) report. Go to uSwitch's Press Room and download the article, dated 12 October. I am unable to extract the URL from the javascript of the link

Many thanks!

Yuck:
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1220579/Carnage-Shame-drunken-student-caught-urinating-war-memorial-mass-pub-crawl.html?ITO=1490&referrer=yahoo

I don't see this guy getting a job in politics..

or perhaps he is just the sort of person we need in a managerial position..

One of the worst QOL factors for me was the horrific commute I had to endure each and every day. Most of the UK Pharma companies and CROs are located West of London along the A40/M4 corridor (e.g. Slough, Maidenhead, Uxbridge etc..). As a result I used to spend anywhere between 1 - 2 hours a day (each way) crawling to work. On a bad day that could tot up to 8-10 hours at work + 4 hours of commute, it was truly soul destroying .

In terms of working from home policies and flexible working, my company was pretty archaic, they expected you to be in by 9 and there until at least 5pm. Switzerland in comparison is a breath of fresh air, they have a transport system that works and complete working time flexibility (clock-in/clock-out system) + good working from home policies for those that need it.

This article seems to confirm everything my Swiss wife thinks about my home town of Sheffield. In a way it's quite reassuring that things have'nt changed so much. You could'nt see it happening in Zürich though

For me, access to quality discos, disco beans, bars and entertainment offered by the behaviour of lower classes is actually pretty high on quality of life index. No joke.

I always felt sorry I didn't stay on in Britain to finish Uni.

of course. anything will have a taste of luxury for you, after your Fribourg prison trauma experience.

Brits know how to party. Being russian, I can apreciate a good bender.

I agree. Quality of Life is a subjective measurement and Quality of Life studies are often aimed at "family life", i.e. access to education, ease of transport links, crime level etc.

London - crap quality of life ? Not if you like bars, resteraunts, circus's, concerts, art museums, history, culture, opera, plays, financial markets, entrepreneurialism. But it comes with some crime, horrible weather, noise blah blah.

There should be quality of life tables depending on situation. Then you could move to your top quality of life country depending on what your looking for in life at the moment.

I have NEVER experienced rain in London. Weather is Britain is no worse then in Switzerland.
London is fantastic for singles and great for wealthy families.

This Zug dude puts Zug as an international city at 9/10 and London 3
(1 min 05 secs in). He looks like the sort of person who enjoys "water sports"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/london/h...00/8292424.stm