New Zealand’s senior managers can buy more goodies with the salaries they earn than can their counterparts in Australia.
That’s according to survey conducted by Mercer Human Resource Consulting, which compares the average salaries and purchasing power of senior managers in 50 countries. In gross pay levels, it found Switzerland to be the world’s top paying country overall, followed closely by Japan and Germany. Other countries that made it to the top 10 were Hong Kong, Denmark, Norway, the US, Belgium, Ireland and the UK (in that order).
In terms of purchasing power, senior managers in Hong Kong, Switzerland and Ecuador were found to be best off, with Germany, the US and South American countries (Chile, Uruguay and Venezuela) also up in the top 10. New Zealand was ranked 13, well ahead of Australia on 25.
On gross pay basis, seven of the top 10 are in Western Europe. While number of these top gross-pay countries also have the highest personal tax and social security rates in the survey, they still rank well on net pay basis – though Belgium drops from gross ranking of ninth to net ranking of 26th. Asian countries do better on net pay basis.
The best places to work both from gross pay and purchasing power basis are Switzerland, Japan, Germany and the US.
The Mercer study, which is designed to help company executives gauge differences in pay levels around the globe did not factor in quality-of-lifestyle factors – where both New Zealand and Australia are well endowed.
