How we structure location data.

CityCalc organizes city data across eight categories used by site selection advisors globally. Data is sourced from official government and multilateral sources wherever possible.

The eight data categories

1. City Overview — population, economic base, language, time zone, currency, airport access, political system
2. Incentives — tax rates, free zones, special economic zones, foreign ownership rules, visa programs, profit repatriation
3. Talent & Costs — salary benchmarks by role level, workforce characteristics, employer obligations, localization requirements, key universities
4. Real Estate — grade A office costs, residential costs, lease terms, recommended districts
5. Legal Framework — legal system, courts, employment law, probation and notice periods, data protection
6. Infrastructure — internet connectivity, VOIP and VPN access, power reliability, disaster risk
7. Competitive — major firms present, anchor institutions, attrition and market dynamics
8. Risk — political, currency, rule of law, security

The scoring framework — six decision pillars

Each city is assessed across fifteen site-selection sub-dimensions used by location advisors — investment readiness, ease of market entry, talent availability, infrastructure, real estate value, cost competitiveness, legal certainty, regulatory stability, political stability, security, transparency, governance, growth momentum, strategic location, and executive attractiveness. To keep a profile readable at a glance, those sub-dimensions roll up into six decision pillars:

• Opportunity & Growth — growth momentum, strategic location, and appeal to senior executives
• Cost Competitiveness — combined cost position across labour, real estate, utilities, and tax
• Talent — depth, scale, and quality of professional, technical, and executive talent
• Infrastructure & Connectivity — air, sea, road, utilities, broadband, and real-estate readiness
• Business Environment — ease of market entry, rule of law, transparency, governance, and operating conditions
• Risk & Stability — institutional stability and security (a higher band means a more stable, lower-risk environment)

Each pillar band is derived from its contributing sub-dimensions. The fifteen sub-scores are retained in full and shown in a "How this band is derived" drawer on every city profile, so nothing is hidden. Two further sub-dimensions — overall readiness and quality of life — remain in the underlying data set but are not surfaced as standalone pillars.

Why we publish bands, not point scores

Precise integer scores (a "73 out of 100") imply a measurement precision we do not have. A single point of difference between two cities is rarely meaningful and invites false comparison. CityCalc therefore expresses every pillar as an indicative band on a five-step ordinal scale — a judgement, not a measured value:

These bands are clearly labelled a CityCalc indicative assessment wherever they appear. They are a starting point for shortlisting, not a substitute for due diligence.

How we label every data point

Beyond the scores, each factual field on a city profile carries one of four honesty labels, so you always know how much weight a number can bear:

• Verified The value is drawn from a cited official or primary source, shown inline.
• Country-level proxy No city-level figure is published, so we apply the national figure from a cited source and flag it as a proxy.
• CityCalc indicative assessment Our own ordinal judgement (the bands above), not a measured value.
• Needs source We do not yet hold a value we are willing to publish. It shows as a placeholder (—) rather than a guess.

Data Confidence

Every detailed city profile carries a Data Confidence tag (for example, "Verified 72%"). It is simply the share of that city's factual fields that are backed by a cited official or primary source — a measure of provenance and coverage, not of accuracy or precision. Indicative band judgements are deliberately excluded from the calculation, so the figure reflects how much of the profile rests on sourced facts rather than on our own assessment. A higher percentage means more of the profile is independently citable.

Sources

• International Monetary Fund country reports and databases
• World Bank data and country economic memoranda
• National statistics authorities and central banks
• Free zone authorities, investment promotion agencies, and finance center registrations
• Transparency International and similar governance indicators
• Published reports from major professional services firms

Data vintage and verification

Data is reviewed on a rolling basis. Where a value has not yet been verified to our standards, it displays as a placeholder (—) rather than an estimated number. We prefer an honest gap over a confident guess.

The CityCalc assessment

Each city profile includes a short CityCalc assessment — our editorial view on how a firm should think about the market. These are clearly marked and separate from the data itself.