Teachers' pay: Which countries pay the most and the least in Europe?

It's World Teachers’ Day, but in many countries, there’s little cause for celebration as teachers are unhappy about their wages and working conditions.

In early September, thousands marched in Budapest calling for higher salaries. Teachers in the United Kingdom are also planning to strike for better pay.

How much are teachers paid in Europe? Which countries pay teachers the most and the least? And how much have teacher salaries changed in the last decade?

There are significant differences in teacher salaries across European countries.

The official annual gross starting salaries in public schools in lower secondary education (ISCED 2) ranged from around €4,233 in Albania to €69,076 in Luxembourg in 2020/2021, according to country data compiled by the European Commission/EACEA/Eurydice.

The average pay for teachers across European Union (EU) countries is €25,055.

Leaving aside Luxembourg, the annual starting salary was above €50,000 in just two countries, namely Switzerland (€66,972) and Germany (€54,129).

The annual salary in France and Italy was less than half the German figure.

Bulgaria had the lowest annual starting teacher salary among EU countries, at €7,731. The figure is also below €10,000 in several other EU countries such as Latvia, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Poland.

The purchasing power standard (PPS) is “an artificial currency unit” defined by Eurostat, where one PPS unit can theoretically buy the same amount of goods and services in each country. Looking at salaries in PPS irons out some of the cost of living differences between countries, but there are still wide disparities.

Teacher salaries seen through this lens ranged from 7,824 PPS in Albania to 50,357 PPS in Germany. While the annual gross starting salary of