[keiferski]

“Living standards” includes things like access to the sea and better weather.

Not everyone cares about having access to the urban amenities that Vienna has. Split is also a pretty nice place, even off-season (I once lived there for 3 months February-April.)

That is why the costs of living between the two are not as disparate as you might expect.

[rafaelmn]

Yes but you can also live in other cities in Europe on the coast with similar or lower prices and different tradeoffs. This is my entire point - this was not the case a few years ago - I would say all the comparable coastal regions in the EU were more expensive.