A report analysing 180 cities has ranked two Australian capitals among the world’s top 10 most affordable places to drink coffee daily.
The report from Chef’s Pencil – using data from the Numbeo crowd-sourced database that tracks cost-of-living and wage data around the globe – looked at the price of coffee as a share of the average local salary in each city.
Swiss cities Geneva and Bern came out on top as the most affordable compared to wage. Despite the average cappuccino costing AU$9.08 and AU$9.23 respectively, enjoying a daily coffee accounted for just 2.4 per cent of the average monthly wage. Rom in Italy also came out at 2.4 per cent, but with an average cappuccino price of AU$2.72.
Sydney placed eighth, with an average cappuccino price of AU$5.14, with a daily coffee representing 2.6 per cent of monthly wage. After Boston in the United States, Melbourne followed in tenth place with an average cappuccino coming in at AU$5.45 and a daily coffee representing 2.7 per cent of monthly wage.
The authors of the report said that while coffee is often most affordable in high-income countries such as Switzerland, social norms also influence affordability.
“While Italy doesn’t have the highest wages in the world, its strong café culture keeps prices low and daily coffee highly accessible,” states the report.
“Australia and New Zealand also stand out, with Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane (2.7 per cent), Perth, Auckland, and Wellington (all 3 per cent) making coffee a relatively accessible everyday treat.”
In emerging countries where coffee is seen as a more luxury item the affordability declined steeply. In Lagos, for example, a daily coffee would represent 57 per cent of the average monthly income.
Read the full report here.
