Are you really well (or badly) paid compared to other employees?

Sometimes you have to speak up to see your salary revalued.

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• INSEE is publishing a study on average and median wages in 2018 on Friday.

• Half of the employees earn less than 1,871 euros net monthly.

• Very high salaries increased much more than others in 2018.

Unless you work in the payroll department of your company or discreetly spy on your neighbor at the office, it is difficult to know how much your colleagues, and especially employees of other companies, really earn.

Fortunately, INSEE is there and can help you partly quench your thirst for curiosity.

The institute is publishing a study on wages * in the private sector this Friday, with the latest data available (dating from 2018).

Compared to 2017, the net salary, in full-time equivalent (EQTP) **, rose from 2,317 to 2,369 euros, an increase of 2.2%, “mainly due to the reduction in the rate of social security contributions (health contributions and unemployment) borne by employees ”, notes the report.

However, taking into account the increase in prices (+ 1.8%) over the same period, the “real” increase (or in “constant euros”) is only 0.4%.

The median salary: 1,871 euros net per month

This average does not provide any information about the pay differentials in France.

For this, we must use the "distribution", which classifies employees according to their level of remuneration and allows to see the disparities.

The result can be seen in the graphic below:

Salary distribution by

We can thus observe that 8 out of 10 employees "have a net salary between the minimum wage (1,177 euros, net of contributions and social contributions) and 3,000 euros per month".

The median salary (50% of employees earn less, 50% earn more than this amount) amounts to 1,871 euros net monthly.

On the high pay side, only 10% of employees receive more than 3,776 euros per month and 5% receive more than 4,932 euros.

Finally, the “top 1%” peaks at more than 9,172 euros per month, almost eight times the minimum wage.

And not to spoil anything, their wages increased six times more (1.2% against 0.2%, taking inflation into account) between 2017 and 2018 than 70% of employees.

Finally, with regard to socio-professional categories, there too, and not surprisingly, there are significant differences, in particular because salaried business leaders, often well paid, are included in the executives. 

CSP remuneration per

High salaries still far from parity

Regarding the pay gap between men and women, "the EQTP salaries of women are on average 16.9% lower than those of men," reports INSEE.

This gap has narrowed by four points since 2008. This is mainly due to the fact that women are better and better represented in the executive category, which is the most remunerative (and therefore which pulls the average upwards).

Evolution of the median salary of men and women per

However, very high salaries are still far from parity: among the very high salaries (over 9,172 euros), 80% concern men.

In a note from 2014, the Economic Analysis Council explained that this imbalance was due in particular to “gender stereotypes” which “can push women to move into jobs with less restrictive hours and less risky prospects, but in average less remunerative, as well as less involvement in competition and negotiation, postures favorable to promotions.

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* Scope of the study: France, EQTP (full-time equivalent) employees in the private sector and public enterprises, including beneficiaries of subsidized contracts and professionalization contracts;

excluding apprentices, trainees, agricultural employees and employees of private employers.

** According to INSEE, “the full-time equivalent salary is a salary converted to full-time throughout the year, regardless of the actual volume of work”.

For example, the EQTP salary of an employee who would have worked 80% of the year and received 16,000 euros will be 20,000 euros (16,000 / 80%).

In terms of workforce, it will be counted by INSEE as 0.8 EQTP.

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