Hong Kong continues to be the highest-ranked country for contingent workforce operations in 2014, followed closely by the U.S. and China, according to the second contingent workforce index released by ManpowerGroup’s (NYSE: MAN) Tapfin division.

Hong Kong and the U.S. are both cost-effective markets, but Hong Kong has the added benefit of higher productivity than the United States, according to the report. While China is both less productive and cost effective than Hong Kong — and has increasingly complex regulations — it has the highest availability of talent of any market.

The index measures and tracks the relative ease of sourcing, hiring and retaining contingent workforce in 75 countries. Each country in the index is assessed on 50 market conditions and statistics that influence contingent workforce conditions. The index ranking reflects a cumulative index ranking based on workforce availability, cost, regulation, and productivity.

“Managing business and workforce strategies globally presents tremendous challenges to business leaders who must align resources and leverage talent holistically,” said Kip Wright, ManpowerGroup Solutions senior vice president.

This year’s index placed greater emphasis on the size of a country’s contingent workforce than the 2013 index did, resulting in a jump in the rankings for countries with large populations and pools of contingent labor, such as China and India. Likewise, countries with smaller pools of available contingent labor have moved down in the rankings.

Here are the 2014 top 10 markets for contingent workforce engagement and their index levels:

1. Hong Kong: 2.75
2. United States: 2.71
3. China: 2.70
4. New Zealand: 2.69
5. Singapore: 2.68
6. India: 2.59
7. Canada: 2.55
8. United Arab Emirates: 2.55
9. Malaysia: 2.47
10. United Kingdom: 2.47