20 Highest Paid World Leaders

In France, President Emmanuel Macron, the head of state, holds more power than the head of government, Prime Minister Édouard Philippe. Despite this, Philippe earns just as much as the French president. Both leaders make more than five times as much as France’s GDP per capita.

Prior to becoming the president of Guatemala, Jimmy Morales was a household name in Guatemala on the Guatemalan TV series “Moralejas” (“Morals”), where he starred alongside his brother. These days, Morales earns more than 30 times the economic output of a typical Guatemalan citizen.

Leo Varadkar is the Taoiseach of Ireland. Taoiseach is an Irish word of Ancient origin meaning “leader” and is used in the Irish Constitution for “the head of the Government or Prime Minister. As Taoiseach, Varadkar earns more than four and a half times the average wage of Irish citizens.

If Katrín Jakobsdóttir‘s salary as the prime minister of Iceland were to be shared across the nation, each Icelandic citizen would receive the equivalent of 73 cents. While the president has a higher base pay than the prime minister in Iceland, the president has limited powers and the role is largely ceremonial as a diplomat and figurehead.

Meanwhile Prime Minister Jakobsdóttir is the highest ranking official within Iceland’s government. Prior to joining the Icelandic government, she had a career in both Icelandic media and academia, where she lectured at various universities in Reykjavík.

Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven began his career as a welder, but he quickly ascended into politics when he became his group’s trade union representative two years into his career. Decades later, in 2005, he became the chairman of the major trade union IF Metall. It was not long before he became the leader of the largest political party in Sweden — Swedish Social Democratic Party — and subsequently elected prime minister.

Queen Margrethe II of Denmark has an annual salary of the equivalent of nearly $13.5 million. She is not, however, an elected official — Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen is. Rasmussen makes a comparatively modest $249,774 a year.

With an annual pay of $254,660, Prime Minister Adrian Hasler is a former banker who worked for VP Bank AG, where the salary of the average employee is $128,648. Hasler was a division head there.

Prime Minister Charles Michel earns more than five times the average wage of a Belgian citizens. Belgium levies one of the highest income taxes for individuals in the world.

Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau earns the equivalent of nearly $270,000 U.S. dollars per year. In Canada, the prime minister’s compensation includes the Member of the House of Commons Basic Sessional Indemnity, the prime minister salary, and the prime minister car allowance.

The average household income in South Africa is $10,872 a year, nearly a third of the average across OECD nations. The President of South Africa, Cryil Ramaphosa, earns more than 25 times the average wage in South Africa. South Africa has been struggling with stagnant GDP growth, high unemployment, and social unrest. As a result, Ramaphosa’s administration declared salary cuts for Members of Parliament and the executive branch. The National Treasury, however, has shown in its 2019 budget statements that Ramaphosa actually received a salary increase for the current fiscal year.

Luxembourg is the smallest nation among the top 10 countries that pay their leaders the most, and if Prime Minister Xavier Bettel’s base pay were to be distributed to Luxembourg’s 596,992 citizens, each would receive 48 cents. While Bettel’s salary is one of the highest in the world, the citizens of Luxembourg trail no other nation on this list in terms of individual wealth.

Chancellor of Austria Sebastian Kurz is much younger than his peers on the global stage, the youngest head of state in the world. When Kurz first entered political leadership at age 22 as chairman of the JVP political party in Vienna, it is unlikely he imagined he would be earning more than six times the average wage of Austrian citizens when becoming appointed as Chancellor only nine years later.

Mauritania is a critical port and rail system within China’s Belt and Road Initiative, which is creating major economic and defense ties between China and Africa. Relations between Mauritania and China’s leadership are stronger than ever, but the differences between the two nations is stark. China’s GDP is 2,400 times Mauritania’s GDP, yet President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz earns almost as much per month as Chinese President Xi Jinping earns per year, according to Saraya, a Jordanian online newspaper.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is paid more than 20 times the economic output of the average kiwi citizen. Presiding over a land known for having more sheep than people, Ardern’s salary would only provide each citizen with 7 cents if her annual base pay were to be shared across the country.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel earns almost eight times the average wage of German citizens. Merkel’s base pay of $369,727 eclipses the average german worker’s income of $46,389. Merkel has served in the role since 2005, earning millions of dollars during her tenure.

Prime Minister of Australia Scott Morrison earns more than seven times the average wage of Australian citizens. Unlike some of his predecessors, Morrison has had a career in public service, where his first job out of university was working as a national policy and research manager for the Property Council of Australia, where he worked for nearly a decade. Australia has no maximum term limits for a prime minister, and if Morrison matched the nearly 12 year held by John Howard in the late ’90s and early aughts, he would amass a fortune of over $4 million.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s salary of $400,000 a year is about seven times the average U.S. per capita GDP. Trump, however, did not actually take home any of this money as he made good on a promise to donate his entire salary.

President Ueli Maurer of Switzerland earns $482,958 per annum — more than any other head of government in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. The OECD is an intergovernmental economic organisation of the 36 highest income economies that are also dedicated to setting transparency standards for governments of global democracies. As part of the OECD standards, Maurer’s salary will always be public knowledge.

Chief Executive of Hong Kong Carrie Lam is known for being at the top of one of the best paid bureaucratic systems in the world. Hong Kong recently raised the salaries of all heads of governments by 12.4% based on the cumulative change in the consumer price index, an economic indicator that measures inflation.

The head of government in Singapore, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, earns more than 20 times the country’s GDP per capita. Could a prime minister’s high salary actually be a perk for citizens? The people of Singapore know one thing for sure: no one can buy off their leadership. According to “Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI),” first released in 1995, which tracks nations’ corruption trends, Singapore is potentially the least corrupt nation in the world. Comparatively, at $1.6 million, Lee earns 12 times as much as Russia President Vladimir Putin. An additional partial explanation for the high salary could be cost of living: Singapore is the most expensive city to live in the world.