Sydney, the only Australian city included in the research, ranked ninth in the economic index of best cities for young people. As the chart below shows, Toronto topped the rankings, followed by New York and Chicago. Lagos, Casablanca and Jakarta were named the worst cities for young people. The Global Youth Survey - which, notably, included both developing and developed nations - highlighted the mobility of today's young people. Three-quarters anticipated moving cities in the coming five years, while close to half had already moved in the previous five years for work, education or a better life. Sydney's young people were less likely to say they would migrate in the coming five years, although the share who thought they would was still high, at 63 per cent.

On the other hand, they emerged as more independent than their overseas peers. As shown below, Sydney's youth are more likely to be working, less likely to be living with their parents and less likely to be receiving money from their family on a monthly basis. However, one in five young people in Sydney said their age was a barrier to employment, compared with one in 10 globally. And Sydney's youth were also less optimistic about their economic futures than their peers overseas, despite the city's top 10 ranking. Less than 65 per cent were optimistic about their future, compared with 75 per cent across the 35 cities. Leo Abruzzese, global director of public policy at The Economist Intelligence Unit, said this pattern was consistent with other wealthy countries, particularly those hit hard by the 2008 global financial crisis.

"Almost without exception the most optimistic people were from emerging-market cities," he said. "Many of those countries are growing quite rapidly … People are feeling more confident because they have opportunities that their parents didn't have 10-20 years ago." Richer countries still have "strong underlying qualities", such as good healthcare and education systems, and money for youth support and mentoring programs, Mr Abruzzese said. This meant they ranked highly on the index, even though their youth tended to be less optimistic.

The Youth Economic Strategy index used 31 economic indicators to compare cities across four main categories: government support and institutional framework, employment and entrepreneurship, education and training, and human and social capital. Sydney's weakest scores were for cost of living (34th), labour-employer co-operation (31st), city GDP growth (30th) and employment growth (29th). Sydney also lagged when it came to policies to support youth (26th) and boost their economic opportunities (26th). "The city itself does not have as many youth-focused programs as other cities we looked at," Mr Abruzzese said. Sydney topped the global rankings for access to finance for tertiary education, quality of education, quality of healthcare and a range of indicators related to doing business and accessing technology.