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Voted Italian. Had a friend who had the opinion that Italian must me the best living language as it's closest to Latin and Spanish after Italian for similar reasons. Provided of course you actually have reasons to like Latin.
I'd skip Russian, can't believe we're sharing the same alphabet with them. Literally my least favorite language together with...French - Unexpected but all for different reasons.
Ultimately just pick the one you like.
Why do you dislike Russian? After all, it's quite similar to Bulgarian.
1. The more complex grammar. Cases especially and "simplified" construction of sentences different from other European languages.
2. The "yaying". Long story to explain but it's something associated with small towns in Bulgaria. The Western parts and I guess Macedonia and Serbia everyone pronounces "e" as written.
Thanks everyone for your replies! And by business I mean I would like to move to a country in Europe and get a job at a big finance firm, or start my own business in a nice European country for a while. Also because I would like to be able to socialize with people around the world. So which language use is most widespread? Thank again everyone for the great replies!
You need more criteria than world, business use, and most interesting. Which part of the world? What business? What interests? Without more specific criteria, I can't vote.
FYI, I was a professional translator for some 25 years, specialized in finance and Italian, as well as the other major romance languages and Greek, lived in those European countries for many years, as well as South America, found a niche and did quite well.
Interesting? To me, culturally? Hebrew and Greek. Maybe Russian (would have said also Turkish, but things appear to be dicey there recently).
Anyway, to make a living, you have to combine a language(s) with a "hard" specialization, like law, finance, medicine, business, finance, technology, engineering and their sub-specializations, and NOT literature and poetry.
Alright, I'll take a stab at it: in today's world, I would say:
1) law and French or German; or
2) Russian and any hard specialization, esp. military/rocket/space technology; or
3) Italian and ship and especially yacht building (but I'm wondering if even all that is done in English only nowadays even in Italy).
Good Luck!
I agree with this, your other specializations will determine which of these languages would be most useful to your career.
20+ years of informal Russian study have been a help to me when "over there". My "hard" specialty is Nuclear Engineering. If you can speak reasonably well, you get respect as a Russian-speaking American, since so few even try and fewer reach real proficiency. You also open up informal communications, people will say things directly to you that they wouldn't say to an interpreter.
Russian is considered much more difficult for native English speakers than German, French, or Italian.
And by business I mean I would like to move to a country in Europe and get a job at a big finance firm ... Also because I would like to be able to socialize with people around the world. So which language use is most widespread?
If you can't decide on a sub-specialization and niche in one European country, I would suggest thinking about Switzerland, despite weakening of banking secrecy laws, still a major global financial hub where German, French and Italian are the official languages, but mainly German and French: while the financial translation (written) niche has become much less profitable because of original production already in English and low-cost Asian translation agencies, social skills (oral), along with technical skills, never go out of style.
And don't rule out the many smaller, boutique financial firms such as private banking and hedge funds, or specialized sectors such as insurance, among the most important in all of finance; all such companies have offices in Switzerland and deal with international clientele.
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Originally Posted by Seattle4321
Thanks everyone for your replies! And by business I mean I would like to move to a country in Europe and get a job at a big finance firm, or start my own business in a nice European country for a while. Also because I would like to be able to socialize with people around the world. So which language use is most widespread? Thank again everyone for the great replies!
German would help you understand other Germanic languages.
Luxembourg is good for banking. Most natives speak 4 languages, Luxembougish, German, French, & English.
How long is for learn a new alphabetic like Cyrillic? Not just learn but be able to read and write all in Russian?
I learned the alphabet in a few weeks, studying about 3 to 5 hours per week. Reading of course came slower. I could read slowly, one word at a time, after about a year. You need a vocabulary of about 500 words before you can do anything practical. I still have trouble writing, but I don't need to write in Russian much and have not emphasized it in my studies.
This brings up the point that speaking, understanding speech, reading, and writing are separate skills. Illiterate people speak and understand, but don't read or write, their native language.
The Cyrillic alphabet is not disjointed from the Latin one. Many of the letters are the same, both start out with "A". Then you have the familiar letters like "H" which in Russian is an "N". Then you have a few unique letters like "Ж". Cyrillic is based on Greek rather than Latin letters.
Best progress would be had by an immersion class, in country, it's good but expensive.
Reading Russian opens up a wealth of classic literature like Master and Margarita, and contemporary works like Pelevin. Reading these in translation is just not the same. Some of my favorite works, even the title won't translate.
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- Unexpected but all for different reasons. 
