Americans’ greater purchasing power compared with many Europeans shows up in an unlikely place: the McDonald’s menu.
A new report finds that the average U.S. worker can afford 10,215 Big Macs a year after taxes, offering a striking snapshot of disposable income.
That total is more than double what workers in France and Germany can buy, and roughly 50% higher than the number affordable for workers in Britain.
The figures are drawn from the Big Mac Index, The Economist’s long-running and unconventional gauge for comparing economic strength across countries.
The latest analysis looks at how much labor is needed to purchase the same widely available product, sold at about 44,000 McDonald’s restaurants worldwide.
Big Macs are priced according to local ingredient and operating costs. A Big Mac in the US averages $6.22, while it’s $7.30 in France and Germany, and just $3.12 in Japan, according to a separate price tracker.
Dividing the cost of a Big Mac by average wages offers an easy-to-understand way to compare the wealth between the working people of different nations.
In America, it’s just 23 minutes of work to afford a Big Mac — or six burgers per hour.
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Americans continue to top the Economist McWages rankings on an annual basis, with a US worker earning nearly $60,000 after taxes — enough to buy 10,215 Big Macs.
That figure is almost twice the roughly 5,000 Big Macs that a worker in France can afford annually, and more than double the roughly 4,000 that can be afforded by German workers.
Switzerland and Australia are in second and third place, respectively, with New Zealand fourth and Israel fifth.
But Americans also work longer hours than many of their European counterparts — and one country has the advantage on Big Macs-per-hour.
Switzerland comes out on top — with Swiss earning the equivalent of seven Big Macs an hour.
Australia, with five burgers for every hour worked, comes third.
The index also tracks wealth growth and decline — because it expresses both wages and the cost of a basic food item.
Germans are not lovin’ it — becoming much poorer in the past two years, as wages have stagnated and prices soared.
However, other countries, such as Latvia, are significantly richer in Big Mac terms than they were two years ago, with the average worker now able to afford an additional burger for every two hours’ work.