These Are the Wealthiest Cities and Countries in the World

With a booming tech industry, one-bedroom apartments going for over $2,000/month, and many young people mulling a move outside the city due to cost of living, it’s no surprise that Toronto is a wealthy city.

Wealth, in this context, refers to the total private money held by all individuals living in the city. That’s the metric used by the Global Wealth Migration Review, which recently released its ‘Wealthiest Cities Worldwide’ ranking.

Toronto is the only Canadian city to crack the top 15. Listed as the 13th wealthiest city in the world, Toronto is noted for having the 9th largest stock exchange and robust financial services, real estate, IT, media and telecoms industries. Toronto’s total wealth totals $944 billion USD.

The top 15 wealthiest cities:

1. New York City
2. London
3. Tokyo
4. San Francisco Bay Area
5. Beijing
6. Shanghai
7. Los Angeles
8. Hong Kong
9. Sydney
10. Singapore
11. Chicago
12. Mumbai
13. Toronto
14. Frankfurt
15. Paris

The Global Wealth Migration Review also ranked the 10 wealthiest countries in the world. Here, wealth also referred to the private wealth held by all the individuals living in each country. Canada landed in the eight spot, at $6.4 trillion USD.

The top 10 wealthiest countries:

1. United States
2. China
3. Japan
4. United Kingdom
5. Germany
6. India
7. France
8. Canada
9. Australia
10. Italy

Another interesting metric in the review is how much a country’s wealth has grown over the past decade. Canadians, for example, have seen their total wealth grow 25% between 2007 and 2017. France, meanwhile, has seen its citizens’ wealth decline 11% in the last 10 years. Residents of China and India have seen their collective wealth grow the most, at 198% and 160%, respectively.

Despite Canadian CEOs taking home more money than ever, Canada actually scores fourth-best when it comes to the most equal countries. This metric calculates the per cent of wealth held by millionaires (lower = more equal):

The 5 most equal countries: