Hong Kong Leads Asia in Entrepreneurship Mobility, says Youth Mobility Index

To commemorate its 10th year anniversary, operator of the ‘.Asia’ regional top-level-domain, today released its first annual ‘Youth Mobility Index (YMI.Asia)’ report. YMI.Asia aims to measure the social, geo-physical and digital mobility of younger generations across Asia to better support young Asian entrepreneurs setting out to change the world.

Hong Kong, one of the world’s leading financial centres, ranks #1 in several areas including Startup Momentum, reveals DotAsia’s Youth Mobility Index. What sets Hong Kong apart from the rest is its independent and free startup culture and the entrepreneurship ecosystem it fosters. This is clearly reflected in YMI.Asia, which places Hong Kong #2 in overall rankings, right after Singapore. In spite of its economic success, Hong Kong is left at the very bottom of the Cost-Happiness Performance ranking.  Why is this so? A recent survey done by the Hong Kong Polytechnic University’s Department of Applied Social Science suggests costly and crowded housing market maybe one of the reason why local youth are less happy than their regional counter parts.

“YMI.Asia rankings are built on our decade long experience engaging millennials across Asia on Internet Governance issues and designed to help aspiring young leaders kickstart their ideas for Asia.  It is also my hope that YMI.Asia could inspire further studies to support and inform policy development locally and regionally to empower youth and enhance digital mobility across Asia,” said Mr Edmon Chung, Chief Executive Officer, DotAsia Organisation.

Youth Mobility as a Competitive Advantage

According to the Global Shapers Annual Survey 2017, the number one concern of youth in Asia is employment. Job and skill obsolescence caused by the changing dynamics of the knowledge economy can cause youth to feel insecure about their future. In response, today’s young Asians are opting for mobility as a guard against personal downturns. Youth mobility thus becomes a competitive advantage not only in education and employment, but also in entrepreneurship for individuals. Mobility offers a new sense of stability in today’s economy.

Youth Mobility Index Top 5:

The findings show that YMI scores correlate positively with GDP per capita, and other competitiveness and development indices, indicating a solid framework for the methodology and interesting points of study highlighted by discrepancies. The results of the YMI rankings reaffirm the commanding lead by the four Asian Tigers – Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and Korea, along with Japan:

  • Singapore (#1) – Tops the overall ranking with a combined highest score across the sub-categories. This is supported by its competency in Education Mobility and an outstanding score in English Proficiency.
  • Hong Kong (#2) – Singapore’s strongest rival, comes in second, demonstrating strong dominance over Entrepreneurship Mobility, with high scoring in total Torrent (i.e. combined outbound and inbound students, migrant, travellers, goods and services).
  • Japan (#3) and Korea (#4) follow subsequently; achieving the highest score in Employment Mobility and overall Sustainability Factor respectively, and showing a high mobility advantage over the traditional GDP per capita economic measure.
  • Taiwan (#5) – Secures the fifth place beating Hong Kong as the most fun place for mobile youth in the Life Experience (LifeX) sub-index within the YMI.

Most Happy Efficient and Quality of Life Experience localities for Youth in Asia:

The YMI.Asia report included 2 subcomponents designed specifically for youth with interesting results from Cost-Happiness Performance and Life Experience Index (LifeX). Cost-Happiness Performance is a measure of happiness over the cost of living at a locality, which is most relevant for cash-strapped youth upstarts.

To download the full report, please visit https://www.ymi.asia

To download the infographics, please visit https://ftp.asia/data/public/6f3c7c