How much the top income earners make in Australia

The weekly salary you have to take home to be counted among Australia’s top income earners has been revealed - so how do you measure up?

Earning $1200 a week or more would place someone in the top half of income earners in Australia, according to new data.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics released median employee earnings, showing the average Aussie is now making $62,400 a year before tax, up $50 a week since August 2020.

However for those not on an annual salary, the median hourly earnings remained unchanged at $36 per hour since August 2020.

Men’s median earnings rose a whopping 6.2 per cent to $1380 a week or $71,760 a year, compared to just 1.8 per cent for women, who took in just $1018 or $52,936 as the pandemic impacted on largely female dominated industries such as retail and hospitality.

Disturbingly, pay levels plummeted by up to 23 per cent in the food and accommodation sector as cafes and restaurants were forced to close.

If you earn more than $62,000 a year than you are in the top half of Aussie income earners. Picture: Getty Images

However, the hospitality industry is in the midst of bouncing back with tens of thousands of vacancies and desperate employers willing to fork out as much as $50 an hour to secure staff.

The best paying jobs in Australia were mining, tradies, finance and insurance and public administration and safety.

People working in mining continued to rake in the big bucks with the median salary sitting at $122,148 after iron ore prices skyrocketed to record highs above $US230 in May.

Tradies, particularly in the electricity, gas and waste collection sector, were making more than finance professionals and public servants.

Their median salary came in at $90,012 compared to $87,724 for those in finance and $83,200 for those working in public administration and safety.

Tradies continued to make good money. Picture: iStock

Those working in the accommodation and food industry actually took a pay cut this year. Their earnings dropped 23 per cent down to $26,000 or from $650 a week in August 2020, down to $500 just a year later.

Median hospitality pay levels have almost gone backwards, only up $6 more than the August 2015 pay of $494 a week.

Other poorly paid industries included retail with a median salary of $41,340 and arts and recreation which paid $46,800.

Bjorn Jarvis, the head of labour statistics at the Australian Bureau of Statistics, said those on already low pay suffered the most.

“Lower paid workers and their jobs were also particularly affected by lockdowns and other restrictions,” he said.

Those working in hospitality were hit hard. Picture: iStock

Overall wage growth has remained incredibly stagnant sitting at historical lows of just 1.4 per cent, according to ABS data released earlier this year.

At Thursday’s Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg announced an upgraded wage forecast, showing real wages, which is the difference between inflation and wages growth would be -0.5 per cent in 2021/22.

It is expected to grow by 0.25 per cent for the three financial years after that but this means wages remain fairly stagnant.

Labor MP Bill Shorten told Sunrise ahead of the announcement that families could be left behind.

“I think there will be a bounce back out of Covid, people have been saving money (and) they’ve got money to spend,” he said.

“But, you know, I do think that Mr Frydenberg might be telling some Christmas fairytales about wages.

“For the last eight years, wages have basically been in the toilet, they haven’t increased at all.”