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The income gap between the lowest and highest earners remains stark in Europe, despite policy measures to tackle such inequality. According to the latest Eurobarometer survey, 81% of Europeans believe that income gaps are too wide and 78% believe that governments should take more action to reduce them.
The problem isn’t, however, exclusive to Europe — with income inequality reaching far higher levels in other parts of the world. But what exactly do the top 10% of earners look like in different countries?
The LIS Cross-National Data Center provides internationally comparable data on income levels. The average after-tax income of the richest decile is expressed in purchasing power parities (PPP), using international dollars at 2017 prices. This means the figures reflect differences in real income levels by taking cost-of-living differences into account.
Since the most recent data available differs by country, only those with data from 2016 or later are included. Because of this variation, the figures show broad patterns rather than year-to-year comparisons, as incomes can change noticeably over just a few years.
US leads in top earners
The United States has the highest average income for the top 10% per year, coming in at 94,857 PPS. Luxembourg ranks second and has the highest post-tax income for the richest decile in Europe, while Switzerland follows in third place. Germany and Australia complete the top five.
After the top three countries, the average incomes of the richest 10% decline gradually with no sharp drops.
Canada, Austria, Norway, Iceland, and Denmark are among the top 10 countries.
Belgium, the UK, Lithuania, Finland, and Spain complete the top 20 countries with the lowest below the 45,000 level.
US remains on top, UK falls out of the richest group
The rankings of the top 10% earners have evolved over the past two decades.
The data is not available for every year in every country, so a fully consistent comparison is not possible. However, the available data still reveals clear trends.
Instead of tracking every single year, five points are shown on the chart below: 2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, and 2020. When data for a specific year was missing, the closest available year was used.
Over this period, among 20 selected major economies, the US remained on top at all five points between 2000 and 2020. Switzerland consistently held second place.
The most notable change occurred in the UK. In 2000, it ranked third — although its position then declined steadily. By 2020, it had fallen to 14th. This shows that the purchasing power of after-tax income for the UK’s top 10% of earners has become comparably weaker.
Germany rose from sixth place to third. France slipped from eighth to eleventh. Italy also declined, moving from 14th to 20th.