MANILA, Philippines — The Philippine capital of Manila is among the worst cities in the world for creatives to live and work in, according to data collected by business company Adventrum.
Research by the company's site Business Name Generator (BNG) determined which 50 cities have the best prospects for creative professionals, be they artists, musicians, choreographers, and the like.
BNG used a weighted index score based on a city's estimated available "creative" roles and their advertised average annual salaries, individual cost of living (excluding rent) and ithe country's happiness score. It also took into consideration establishments and spaces that contribute to the creative process, such as museums, art galleries, green spaces, classes, and workshops.
The site collected the data from November 15 to 18, 2022, and took out Marrakech in Morocco and Ghanaian cities from the seedlist because of insufficient data.
The metrics showed that the best city for creatives was the Japanese capital Tokyo, which had the highest number of creative jobs, green spaces, galleries and classes/workshops giving it a dominant 8.0 score.
Second-placed London of the United Kingdom was a far second, scoring 5.4, though its average yearly salary for creatives at $52,202 (P2.87 million) is higher than Tokyo's $38,674 (P2.12 million).
This is, however, juxtaposed with London's higher monthly cost of living (excluding rent), which is more expensive than Tokyo by $56 (P3,000).
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The French capital Paris and American city Chicago were close in third and fourth, respectively, while Canada's Toronto and the city-state Singapore tied at fifth with 4.8 metric score.
The Indian cities of New Delhi and Mumbai were found to be the worst cities for creatives, with similar metric scores of 2.8. It found that this is likely because of these cities' lower average salaries for creatives despite having more available creative jobs than Chicago and Toronto.
Manila was the fifth-worst city with a metric score of 3.2, and while it had the most available creative roles in the Bottom 10 at over 14,000, it had the least number of green spaces (17) and museums and galleries (22) and the lowest average annual salaries for creatives at $5,641 (P310,000).
Sandwiched in between Manila and the Indian cities were the South African capital of Johannesburg and Israel's Tel Aviv, both scoring 3.1. Portugal's second-largest city, Porto, actually tied with Manila at 3.2.
BNG also found that the six highest-paying cities for creatives were all in the United States, with San Francisco leading the charge with an average annual salary of $86,300 (P4.74 million). Its neighboring city, Los Angeles, also made it to the top spot along with other American cities, namely, New York, Boston, Miami and Chicago.
Non-American cities in the Top 10 of highest-paying cities for creatives were Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, the Danish capital Copenhagen, the earlier mentioned Singapore and Hong Kong.
"With creative hubs around the world aiming to attract and retain talent, they must be able to offer an environment for individuals to flourish, by investing in the wide range of industries in that creatives play a key role, as well as paying competitive salaries that can keep up with the rising cost of living," said BNG spokesperson Chloe Chai.
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