KEY POINTS:
BRUSSELS - Prague, Copenhagen and Dublin are the top European cities for finding a new job, a survey showed yesterday.
An opinion poll, carried out last November for the European Commission, said 70 per cent of respondents agreed it "was easy" to gain new employment in the Czech, Danish and Irish capitals.
In general, Athens, Bucharest and London are the most unpopular European capitals among their own inhabitants, the survey said.
According to the Eurobarometer poll, carried out in 75 cities across the European Union plus Croatia and Turkey, around 90 per cent of people living in Copenhagen, Luxembourg and Tallin said they were satisfied with living in their city.
Despite easy access to the Irish job market, 94 per cent of Dubliners also think it is difficult to find housing at a reasonable price in their expanding city, with only Luxembourg and Paris fairing worse in the survey.
House prices in Ireland have more than quadrupled since the country's economy began to boom in the late 1990s and fell for the first time in over five years in March.
"Given the steep increase of housing prices in many EU countries ... it comes as no surprise that only 27 per cent of the respondents agree that it is easy to find good housing at a reasonable price," the poll said.
The Greek capital, Athens, ranks consistently low in the opinion of its inhabitants, regarding a variety of issues such as air pollution, availability of green spaces and parks, or perceived safety.
Dissatisfaction is also high among city dwellers in Palermo and Naples, who complain about public transport, lack of green areas and nearly 100 per cent agreed it is very hard to find good jobs.
The two Italian cities also rank among the bottom of the table as far as health care services are concerned. Most of their residents do not think public funds are being spent responsibly.
An average of 97 per cent of those polled in Nordic countries such as Denmark, Finland and Sweden said they "sometimes or always feel safe in their cities", while over 50 per cent of people living in Naples said the opposite.
- REUTERS
