Which European countries have the best salaries after taxes?

simianwords

why is switzerland not there but norway and iceland are

justonceokay

If you decide to live in Iceland instead of France (for example) for the tax benefits, you get exactly what you deserve

jghn

Even from a pure financial perspective, given one benefit of these countries is you generally actually get useful benefits out of your tax dollars unlike the USA, wouldn't a better way of looking at this be some sort of weighted metric? Imagine there's country A where i get a net salary of X and Y units of value out of my tax money. And country B where my net Salary is (X-M) and I get (Y+N) out of my tax money. Depending on the values of M & N, country B could be a clear winner at the end of the day.

NalNezumi

Looking at salaries after tax is completely meaningless, what is even this article trying to infer. You have to take in to account the cost of living and also quality of services you get for it. France & Sweden is close in the numbers but France is notably cheaper to eat out and Healthcare quality can't even be compared (to French favor). But if you're wealthy you'd probably prefer Sweden still because of the low taxes around wealth. I recently compared (by actually going there) Switzerland vs Sweden when I passed a FAANG tech interview in Zurich, but even with 4-5x Salary of what I have now, I would probably end up living poorer if I had kids (if more than 2, it's for certain) in Zurich. So like, who is this article for.

atoav

It does not matter. I'd rather live in a country I like to live in, based on culture, food, society, etc. than earn slightly more. Or phrased differently: what are you going to buy with the extra money that is gonna offset you living in a country you dislike? Choosing a country in Europe is not like choosing a state in the US. The systems, culture, people, food and so on differ much more wildely. Choosing that over a minor tax difference thst could change with the next government is downright unhinged.

admaiora

Isn't this article just plain wrong? These are nowhere near the after tax salaries, an average working Dutch person (even when excluding unemployed) is not grossing 9-10k a month with 6k euros net as this suggests. I think the article is confusing employer-side hourly labour costs with net earnings.

dns_snek

I don't know whether this is AI slop or what. The first chart definitely doesn't show average salary AFTER tax, maybe it's a total cost to employer on hourly basis before any taxes or SSC. And the second chart titled "Where do taxes weigh the most on employers and employees?" doesn't actually show what it purports to show. It only shows a small slice of the social security contributions that employers pay. It shows: 100% * (Employer SSC / Total cost to employer), but: Total tax = Tax + Employer SSC + Employee SSC. Total cost to employer = Gross salary + Employer SSC + "benefits/costs" (vary by country) Paid out to employee = Gross salary - Tax - Employee SSC + "benefits/costs" Here's where you can actually find a half-decent comparison: https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/taxing-wages-2025_b3a95... See Table 3.1 on page 71 for a summarized overview of "total tax wedge vs total employer cost" in various living situations (single, with children, low/average/high wage). Note that this still doesn't tell the full story because it ignores some benefits and entitlements that depend on your living situation ("Non-standard tax relief").

Flere-Imsaho

No UK? Last time I checked it was in Europe. I imagine it's right near the bottom...

themgt

The first chart is labeled "Hourly wage after taxes (€)" and links to a specific table in official Eurostat[0]. This Eurostat table is "Labour cost levels by NACE Rev. 2 activity" - afaict Eurostat defines[1] "labour cost" as: core expenditure borne by employers for the purpose of employing staff. They include employee compensation, with wages and salaries in cash and in kind, employers' social security contributions and employment taxes regarded as labour costs minus any subsidies received, but not vocational training costs or other expenditure such as recruitment costs and spending on working clothes In other words, this doesn't whatsoever represent "hourly wage after taxes" and this article is complete slop. [0] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/LC_LCI_LEV__c... [1] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/de/lc_lci_lev_e...

lbreakjai

This article is surprisingly missing Belgium, which I expected to see at the top of the employee costs.

ginko

The numbers for Norway aren't plausible at all. Full time 45€ after tax would be a yearly net income of 95000 euros. At a ~50% marginal tax rate that's be a yearly income of over 2 million kroner. No way that's the average. According to Statistics Norway the monthly average salary in Norway was 62070kr in 2025, so 744840kr per year. https://www.ssb.no/en/arbeid-og-lonn/lonn-og-arbeidskraftkos...

dgrin91

These numbers can get wonky fast. E.g. devs salaries in Ukraine are pegged to the dollar, so they get free raises as the exchange rates plummet. At the same time the cost of living in Ukraine was low before the war and only got lower. Oh and taxes are pretty low in Ukraine. So I'm pretty sure Ukranian devs will end up with one of the top salary rates in all of Ukraine, but the externalities of that are large.