A recent stuy by the Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) shows that Oslo, Copenhagen and London are the three most expensive cities in Europe. The most expensive German cities are Munich (#14 in Europe) and Frankfurt (#17). Whereas Dublin scores #4 on that list Berlin is obviously still pretty affordable as it only scores #23. On a global scale, the same study continues, because of the weak dollar New York City now only is as expensive or cheap as Brussels or Lyon (France) - that is if you're paid in Swiss Francs or €uros...
Do you have a link to the study? I'd be interested to see how they weighted different expenses.
I read another study, I think it was Forbes, which put Moscow, St Petersburg, and London as the most expensive cities in Europe.
It's in German. Since 1971 they compare a basket filled with products and services and compare across the cities including average price for rent per square meter, average wages, time you need to work on average to buy a Big Mac and the net hourly wage divided by the total basket excluding rent. I'm using a German newspaper's summary here. It's pretty recent so I'm sure you can find it on UBS.com. Again it is Eurocentristic.
There are many of these kind of studies. I do remember one with the Russian cities being on top of the list as well. Scandinavian cities, London and Dublin, the Russian big cities, Iceland and Zurich are on top of all of those lists.