Salary Ranking by Country

What salary.gg compares across countries

Every result page ranks your salary against 14 countries at once — Korea, Japan, the United States (50 states + D.C.), the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Italy, Australia, Singapore, the Netherlands, Canada, Germany, Taiwan and Hong Kong — each computed from that government's own official wage distribution. You see your rank both within your age cohort and across all ages, and every country's published age bands are interpolated to single-year granularity so your exact birth year is used rather than a coarse bracket. Currency conversions use nominal market exchange rates, not purchasing-power parity, so the same pay can sit near the top in one country and mid-pack in another. For the United States you additionally get state-level and 22-occupation-group detail.

See the full cross-country comparison →

Sources and reliability

Every wage distribution, tax bracket, and social-insurance rate comes from official government sources only — the national statistical agency and tax authority of each country: Statistics Korea (KOSIS) and the National Tax Service; Japan's MHLW Basic Survey on Wage Structure and NTA; the U.S. Census Bureau (ACS PUMS), IRS and SSA plus each state's Department of Revenue; the UK's ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings and GOV.UK; France's INSEE and URSSAF; Spain's INE and Agencia Tributaria; Italy's INPS and Agenzia delle Entrate; Australia's ABS and ATO; Singapore's Ministry of Manpower, CPF Board and IRAS; the Netherlands' CBS and Belastingdienst; Statistics Canada and the CRA; Germany's Destatis and §32a EStG; Taiwan's DGBAS; and Hong Kong's Census and Statistics Department and Inland Revenue Department. No proprietary adjustments and no inference — only each country's most recently published official data and rates. Full per-country sourcing, methodology and caveats are on each country's landing page.

Frequently asked questions

What does salary.gg compare across countries?

Every result page shows the entered salary's percentile rank in all 14 covered countries simultaneously, computed from each country's official wage distribution. Because wage levels and exchange rates differ, the same salary can rank near the top in one country and around the middle in another — see your exact per-country figures on the compare page or your result page. This cross-country view is the primary differentiator vs. single-country calculators like SmartAsset, PayScale, or Levels.fyi.

Does the same percentile mean the same standard of living across countries?

No. The site uses nominal exchange rates to convert salaries, not purchasing-power parity (PPP). A U.S. salary at the same percentile as a Korean salary may purchase different amounts of housing, healthcare, or food. PPP-based comparison is a planned follow-up. Use nominal percentile as a rough ranking signal, not a cost-of-living equivalence.

Which countries are covered and which are planned?

Currently covered: Korea (KOSIS), Japan (MHLW), the United States (Census ACS PUMS, 50 states + D.C., 22 occupation groups), the United Kingdom (ONS ASHE), France (INSEE), Spain (INE), Italy (INPS), Australia (ABS), Singapore (MOM), the Netherlands (CBS), Canada (Statistics Canada), Germany (Destatis), Taiwan (DGBAS) and Hong Kong (C&SD) — 14 countries in total. Each requires an open official wage-distribution dataset with cohort-level granularity; further expansion depends on equivalent official data.

How is user input handled — is anything stored?

Salary and birth year inputs are processed entirely in the user's browser. Results are encoded into the shareable URL (base64), not stored on a server. No account or login required. No personally identifiable information is collected beyond standard anonymous web analytics (Google Analytics 4).

How recent are the wage statistics?

Each country's wage statistics are its most recently published official release — for example Korea's 2024 KOSIS data (released 2026-02-23), Japan's 2024 MHLW data, and the U.S. 2024 Census ACS 1-year PUMS (released 2025-10-16); the same 'latest official release' principle applies to all 14 countries. Tax rates and social insurance rates reflect 2026 applicable values (IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32, SSA 2026 wage base, Korean NTS 간이세액표 2026, Japanese NTA 月額表 2026).