Highest Paid Presidents / PM's around the World
The Economic recession has hit one and all, salary cuts and pink slips have taken their toll on the common man. Presidents, Prime Ministers are no exception. Most of the heads have cut down on their salaries or are planning to do so in the near future. Lets take a look at what the heads of top nations are earning.
Lee Hsien Loong, Singapore
(Country GDP: $235.6 billion - 2008)
Politicians in Singapore are amongst the most highly paid government officials in the world. Lee Hsien Loong, Prime Minister of Singapore earns five times more than the American President. Lee Hsien Loong takes an annual salary of $2.46 million.
Barack Obama, USA
(Country GDP: $13.81 trillion - 2007)
Second on the list is the President of the biggest economy of the world with a GDP of $13.81 trillion (2007). President Elect, Barack Obama will be getting an annual salary of $400,000 when he joins office next year.
Kevin Rudd, Australia
(Country GDP: $773 billion - 2007)
Third on the list is the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd with an annual salary of $330,300.
Angela Merkel, Germany
(Country GDP: $2.585 trillion - 2006)
The first lady chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel receives an annual salary of € 242,000 (€ 22000 bonus included) ~ $ 307,340.
Nicolas Sarkozy, France
(Country GDP: $1.871 trillion - 2006)
The French President, Nicolas Sarkozy gets an annual salary of € 240,000 ~ $ 304,800. This is after he doubled his salary earlier this year.
Stephen Harper, Canada
(Country GDP: $1.274 trillion - 2007)
Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of the seventh largest economy of the world, Canada recieves an annual salary of $280,000.
Gordon Brown, UK
(Country GDP: $2.772 trillion - 2007)
Gordon Brown, Prime Minister of the second biggest economy in Europe and fifth largest in the world receives an annual salary of € 187611 ~ $238,266.
Vladimir Putin, Russia
(Country GDP: $2.076 trillion -2007)
The Russian Prime Minister recieve an annual salary of $81,190, which is significantly less than his counterparts.
The graph below shows a comparison between GDP and Salaries of heads of Top Nations.
51 Responses to "Highest Paid Presidents / PM's around the World"
It would be interesting to also see a salary/GDP ratio graph, ie. salary = x% of GDP. Also, I wonder if the cost of living in Singapore might be higher (although maybe not 5 times higher) than in other countries?
Graph (on Flickr)
big
Does a plumber in the US earn 10 times that of a Canadian plumber because that's the ratio of their GDPs? No he won't.
Secondly, does a country with a smaller GDP take less work as a president versus one with a large GDP? Not necessarily. I don't know but, I would bet the bush administration costs considerably more than any of the other governments to run.
Putin does not need a lot of pay, because he have to power to move 4billion dollars in a single day by just talking...
you gotta wonder what they are willing to do for him behind the curtain...
BTW, we're not so proud of this fact as he's a useless shrek-a-alike
Kevin Rudd gets paid $330,000 in Australian Dollars. Based on today's exchange rate, that's just shy of $209,000 US, which puts him at around the same ration of GDP to Salary as Canada.
Also, Australia is listed by the OECD as one of the few countries not headed for a recession in the next 2 years, so he's doing something right.
It's enough to make me lose faith in humanity.
not bad for a country with a population of 4 million and who are in a recession
I think that sort of makes sense. Why would an official take a 100000 bribe when he already earns millions? And if he were paid under the table for millions, you'd think someone's gonna spot the huge shift of money.
Of course... lets not go into the government's reputation and ability to run a country.
but he could buy anything he wants :)
amazing...belief or not...belief it.
Deden
Success With Women
The intent then is to draw in the brightest... at least of those intensely money-oriented. Plus, with the usual politically ambitious, politician-recruiting is engineered to be highly optimized.
Furthermore, if the country does poorly vis-a-vis GDP rates (a crucial metric for such a small country without much in natural resources or military forces, albeit solid geographical and financial infrastructure), usually a result of poor corporate performance, the drop in executive salaries is reflected on the politicians themselves. This isn't the most direct or responsive solution (considering that international forces are constantly at play and public policies are often multi-year ventures), but it is a flexible way to quantitatively motivate (and punish) the politicians to keep Singapore growing, much less afloat.
We must have leaders willing to work for the people first and not the millions salary. If they only wants money, then they are working for the wrong job, go be a wall street banker. A PM/president must be able to sacrifice his time and effort for the good of the people, you cant have power and yet be paid like a millionaire. There is no such good life in this world. You made mistake and still able to hold your job and yet cab talk a lot of crap. such a job cab only be found in Singapore. Who wants to be a SG Prime minister?
日本の首相勝ったな（＠ｗぷ
圧倒的に勝った（＠ｗ荒
The reason why Singapore needs to give high salaries is because no person of integrity is going to be a "Yes man" to the Father and Son dictatorship.
The side effects of giving high salaries are that:
1. Only "Yes men" are recruited
2. Only greedy men are recruited.
3. Not accountable for major mistakes because high salary is too good to give up.
4. Singapore is run like a company. "Leaders" are well paid executives.
5. "Leaders" spend their time thinking of ways to maximise profits for the company by taxing the people. Heard of TV/Radio licence tax? Yes, you need a licence to own a TV and radio in Singapore.
6. "Leaders" adopting a superior than thou attitude because they are well paid executives of Singapore Inc, not people representatives.
7. "Leaders" getting more greedy because they are used to the high life that their high salaries can afford them and want more. In effect they may be more susceptible to corruption.
7. Artificially inflating GDP growth to justify more pay increases and bonuses. The GDP per capita of USD$30,000 sounds impressive but let me give you an idea of the salaries the average joe is earning. Clerk - USD$800/month/44 hour week. Retail staff - USD$650/month.
NOTE: Singapore have bare minimal state welfare. Old people who cannot work, and have no family gets USD$215 per month and frequently go without electricity and meals.
The reason behind it being that well paid 'leaders' will not be corrupt. Which is Lame.
The worst thing is that being a one party system, they rubber stamp any policy favourable to the elite member of the society. And when shit happens, they do not take responsibilty, but blame it on the people of the country instead.
Thanks for doing the leg work on this research, very interesting stuff!
Many MNCs paid their executives very well and yet what happened.
You could all talk about all sides of the issue and they will just continue to take your ancestors, yours and your children money, laughing all the way to the bank.
Its time to curb their excess. they have enjoyed enough and must pay back.
In reality, high pay encourages politicians to LEGALISE the activities normally considered corruption.
LEGALISED CORRUPTION!
where 90% of MPs belong to ruling party, to pass the law and thats it. Heck, even if they were to paythemselves 1 billion each, we just can't do anything.
You are also judged by your results as well.
Do you know how well Singapore is doing with only human resources and nothingelse?
Do you know how much foreign reserves they have per capita? How much businesses and investments they have around the world? A nation state born with nothing in 1963. Compare Singapore with her neighbours with all the resources. What have become of them - going backwards perhaps? Results talk for itself. Be happy when others are doing better than us. If we cannot give attributes and face real facts, then we are just being in denial and jealous. And we will not be a success. Success is in your make-up!!!! Success is in your attitutes and your INTEGRITY.
One last thing , tell me why one of the smallest countires in the world , with only 40 years existance has such an arrogant government and population ?
Also looking at SE Asia in general , these countries have missed the opportunity to be 1st world , and most are now just authoritarian regimes .
40 yrs with such an restounding achievement calls is commendable by any standards. Dun be such a sour grape. The results speaks for themselves. Empty talk without evidence is useless.
The US president has the white house, air force one and secret service, while the PM Lee only have his own office and he even needs to fork out extra out from his pay for his own chauffeur.
After serving his term/s, the US president continues to earn big bucks through royalties from writing books and giving speeches from the lecture circuits, while Old Lee donates all his book royalties to charities.
Also in singapore's context, political leadership is selected mainly based on merit, thus many of these people are already doing very well in the private sector as top doctors, CEOs, managers, tecnocrats, etc, where taking up a government job means a pay cut. Thus many of these people have to be convinced or "forced" by the PM to serve. while for the US presidency, its more of a larger purpose that they do it, you feel it through the presidential campaigns and so on..
When you factor all those unseen context, frills and perks, it is even possible that the US presidents got a better deal.
Post a Comment