Thailand takes top spot for expats
HSBC International is soon to release the full results from its 2011 Expat Explorer survey. In their preview, Thailand comes out top of the league table for lifestyle and economic factors. Bahrain was last year’s leader and despite social unrest and political uncertainty is has surprisingly only dropped down to 13th place. An even bigger surprise is Egypt and Saudi Arabia in second and third place respectively. Looks like expats are acting remarkably tough, or could this be the effect of the large additional cash payments some expatriates are getting to stay on these countries?
The top 5:
- Thailand
- Egypt
- Saudi Arabia
- Singapore
- Switzerland
The crisis is denting optimism?
In 2010, 87% of expats said they intended to stay whereas this fell sharply down to 64% in 2011 – probably a reflection of reduced work opportunities in many popular expat destinations.
In contrast, the amount of expats saying they have more disposable income after relocation has risen from 56% to 63%.
The full results will be available at the end of November – you can look at the preview today.
