Study: How expensive is work? Country comparison

How expensive is work(ing) in a cross-country comparison – for employees and employers? How does Austria compare with the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe? Where are the ancillary wage costs for companies particularly high? And where do employees retain the highest net amount of their salary or wages, after deductions? A recent study conducted by the TPA Group & Kienbaum provides answers to these questions.

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In which Country employees retain the highest net amount of their salary or wages?

What is left after the deduction of social security and payroll tax, in the account?

  • Austria is – unsurprisingly – always in first place by a wide margin in terms of total costs.
  • This is followed by Slovenia, the Czech Republic and Slovakia for all groups of persons – all three are direct neighbours of Austria.
  • The total costs of Poland, Croatia and Hungary are in the “midfield”.
  • Montenegro, Romania, Serbia and Bulgaria have low total costs (the ranking varies depending on the group of persons).
  • Albania has the lowest total costs for all groups of persons.
  • It is striking that the personnel costs in the non-EU countries are comparatively low. Furthermore: Those countries that joined the EU earlier (Slovenia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, Hungary) have higher costs than the countries that joined the EU later (Romania, Bulgaria).
  • In other words, personnel costs are definitely lower in South-Eastern Europe.

How expensive is work? CEE countries under examination

The current study was conducted 2022 by TPA partners & tax advisor Dr. Wolfgang Hoefle, SEE-region expert Thomas Haneder and TPA Group partner Klaus Bauer-Mitterlehner.

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