Average Annual Salary in Spain (2024)
Average annual wages in Spain from 1990 to 2024, expressed in constant 2024 USD at purchasing power parity. At $54,564 in 2024, Spain sits approximately 11% below the OECD average of $61,147. Source: OECD Average Annual Wages dataset.
Data
| Year | Avg. Annual Wage (USD PPP) | YoY Change |
|---|---|---|
| 1990 | 48,340 | — |
| 1991 | 49,882 | +3.2% |
| 1992 | 51,725 | +3.7% |
| 1993 | 52,551 | +1.6% |
| 1994 | 53,100 | +1% |
| 1995 | 52,046 | -2% |
| 1996 | 52,751 | +1.4% |
| 1997 | 52,808 | +0.1% |
| 1998 | 53,090 | +0.5% |
| 1999 | 53,059 | -0.1% |
| 2000 | 51,905 | -2.2% |
| 2001 | 51,634 | -0.5% |
| 2002 | 51,892 | +0.5% |
| 2003 | 51,629 | -0.5% |
| 2004 | 50,971 | -1.3% |
| 2005 | 51,191 | +0.4% |
| 2006 | 50,947 | -0.5% |
| 2007 | 51,499 | +1.1% |
| 2008 | 53,319 | +3.5% |
| 2009 | 56,675 | +6.3% |
| 2010 | 56,138 | -0.9% |
| 2011 | 55,135 | -1.8% |
| 2012 | 53,591 | -2.8% |
| 2013 | 53,598 | 0% |
| 2014 | 53,431 | -0.3% |
| 2015 | 54,228 | +1.5% |
| 2016 | 53,927 | -0.6% |
| 2017 | 53,224 | -1.3% |
| 2018 | 53,084 | -0.3% |
| 2019 | 53,700 | +1.2% |
| 2020 | 53,463 | -0.4% |
| 2021 | 55,357 | +3.5% |
| 2022 | 53,954 | -2.5% |
| 2023 | 54,460 | +0.9% |
| 2024 | 54,564 | +0.2% |
About this Dataset
In 2024, Spain's average annual salary stood at $54,564 in constant 2024 USD, adjusted for purchasing power parity. That is approximately 11% below the OECD-wide average of $61,147, placing Spain in the lower-middle tier of OECD economies. The figure covers mean gross wages for a full-time, full-year equivalent employee across the total economy, compiled by the OECD Centre for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs from national accounts and labour force surveys.
Spain's 2024 average wage of $54,564 is $6,583 below the OECD average of $61,147. Real wage growth over the past decade was just 2.1% between 2014 and 2024. For labour cost modelling, total employer cost in Spain typically runs 25–35% above the gross wage once social security contributions are included.
The dataset covers Spain from 1990 to 2024 at annual frequency. Key methodological notes:
- Unit: Constant 2024 US dollars, adjusted for purchasing power parity using OECD deflators
- Definition: Mean gross annual wage of full-time, full-year equivalent employees, total economy
- Coverage: 1990–2024, annual frequency, Spain (ISO-3: ESP)
- Measure code: WG (average wage) with USD_PPP unit measure, series AV_AN_WAGE
- Publisher: OECD Centre for Employment, Labour and Social Affairs (ELS.SAE)
The most striking feature of Spain's wage series is the 2009 spike. Average wages jumped 3.5% in 2008 and a further 6.3% in 2009, reaching $56,675 — the highest point in the 35-year record. This was not a genuine wage boom. Spain's construction sector collapsed during the global financial crisis, shedding several million low-wage workers in a short period. The remaining employed workforce had a higher average wage, pushing the statistical mean upward even as GDP and total employment fell sharply. This composition effect is a known feature of aggregate average wage series during severe recessions with uneven job loss across skill levels.
From 2010 to 2014, wages fell as Spain underwent fiscal consolidation and internal devaluation. Average wages dropped from $56,138 in 2010 to $53,431 in 2014, a real decline of 4.8% over four years. Public sector wage cuts, labour market reforms under the 2012 Ley de Reforma Laboral, and rising long-term unemployment all contributed. Recovery from 2015 was gradual: wages drifted back toward $53,700 by 2019, without recovering the 2009 peak.
The COVID-19 shock in 2020 was relatively muted in this series (-0.4%, from $53,700 to $53,463), partly because Spain's ERTE (Expediente de Regulación Temporal de Empleo) furlough scheme kept most workers formally employed. A sharper real contraction hit in 2022 (-2.5%, from $55,357 to $53,954) as inflation accelerated faster than nominal wages. Wages have since stabilised at $53,954 in 2022, $54,460 in 2023, and $54,564 in 2024 (+0.2%), suggesting nominal gains are roughly tracking price growth again but not pulling ahead.
Spain's structural wage gap relative to the OECD average reflects several labour market features: a high share of temporary and part-time contracts (Spain has typically had the EU's highest share of involuntary temporary employment), a sectoral mix weighted toward lower-productivity services such as hospitality and retail, and productivity growth that has lagged northern European peers since the early 2000s. The government's sustained SMI increases since 2019 have raised the wage floor significantly, but analysts benchmarking labour costs for Spanish operations or consumer-facing businesses should treat the OECD mean as an indicator of full-time equivalent costs rather than typical take-home pay across the workforce.