S’pore Ranked 2nd With the Highest Average Salaries in 2022, Losing Only to Switzerland

Does a high average salary mean that we’re all rich?

Not really, cause we have a pretty high cost of living too. Here are all of the data, broken down for you.

Second-Highest Average Net Salary

The CEOWORLD magazine published a list of average net salaries after tax, revealing the highest and lowest salaries in the world.

In the first place, we have Switzerland with an average monthly net salary of US$6,142.10.

Surprisingly, Singapore holds the second place, with an average monthly net salary of US$4,350.79. That’s about S$$6,050.

Behind us are Australia, the United States, and the United Arab Emirates, with salaries of US$4,218.89, US$3,721.64, and US$3,663.27 respectively.

In contrast, the lowest average monthly net salary is US$143.62 in Sri Lanka, followed by US$163.17 and US$166.33 in Pakistan and Nigeria respectively.

Ranked Highly Due To Low Taxes?

When we look at the average monthly salary without deducting taxes, Singapore actually doesn’t rank that highly.

According to paylab.com, Switzerland would still hold its place at the top of the list, with an average gross salary of US$7,585.09. However, Singapore is at the eighth position, with an average gross salary of US$4,931.45.

This could suggest that Singapore’s high ranking is due to our relatively low taxes as compared to countries like Switzerland, which has more than a thousand dollars difference in net and gross salary.

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High Salary, But Also High Cost of Living and Long Work Weeks

Instead of merely looking at salary to determine whether we’re rich or not, we should also consider the cost of living in different countries. Earning lots may not translate into wealth if most of the money is being spent on daily necessities and rent.

According to World Population Review, an independent organisation that sources and compiles data from government sites, Singapore’s cost of living is estimated to be about US$2,169 per month. This is calculated by measuring the cost of things like mortgage, utilities, and groceries.

If we calculate that in terms of our estimated average net salary per month, we’re spending almost 50% of our salary just on basic living costs.

In contrast, Switzerland’s estimated cost of living is US$2,497 per month, which is about 40% of their average net monthly salary.

Additionally, Singapore ranks fourth in the countries with the longest work weeks, with a whopping 44.8 hours. Meanwhile, Switzerland ranked 10th from the bottom of the list, with an estimated 28.8 hours. This data was taken from 2019 and 2020 though, so the pandemic might have altered these rankings.

After looking at these statistics, don’t you suddenly feel like moving to Switzerland instead?

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