junior jetset
can anybody out there shine some light on ATC salaries, for different countries please.
It's not quite as simple as that, I'm afraid, because what I think you are looking for, a comparison of salaries can be very misleading.
A low salary in a country with a low cost of living could give you an equally good living as someone living where you live.
Also, allowances and perks are generally not included in salary. Then you have to convert an overseas salary to your own currency to get a true comparison.
To give you a couple of examples, if you had worked for Eurocontrol a few years ago you would have been entitled to purchase a tax-free car every year, if you were French. So, if you treated yourself to a top of the range car every year it would have been quite a saving.
If you work in the Middle East you generally don't pay any tax, so you need to add your local tax rate to that to compare. Many Middle East packages also include free accommodation and free utility bills. These can add up to quite substantial outgoings if you have to pay them yourself out of your salary.
My own situation in my last ATC outfit, if you include all allowances, meant that to earn the same in my home country I would have needed to earn in the region of €360,000, but my salary was nowhere near that sum and with changing exchange rates would now be substantially lower. Also, the cost of living was substantially higher than my home country.
You need to compare total packages rather than just salary to get a meaningful comparison.