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masamunecyrus t1_it1cue9 wrote

The data came from here

https://data.oecd.org/earnwage/average-wages.htm

But I'm not sure how they're counting that because there is absolutely no way I believe the average U.S. wage is $74,738.

Per the U.S. government, median household income is $65,712, and about half of all households are dual-income.

Edit: I learned to read.

> Average wages are obtained by dividing the national-accounts-based total wage bill by the average number of employees in the total economy, which is then multiplied by the ratio of the average usual weekly hours per full-time employee to the average usually weekly hours for all employees. This indicator is measured in USD constant prices using 2016 base year and Purchasing Power Parities (PPPs) for private consumption of the same year.

So it's mean, not median, which is misleading, first of all. And I don't know why they bother trying to normalize by working hours, because a lot of people work longer than whatever that number is.

Edit 2' In any case, median personal income in the U.S. is about $56,000. In Switzerland, it appears to be about $50,000, though that's disposable income, after subtracting taxes, health insurance, and social insurance.

Subtracting standard federal taxes and average health monthly health insurance premium drops the US wage to about $45,000. That doesn't include state taxes, which might be another few thousand dollars.

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