Developer salary surveys almost always report gross pay, which makes them useful for negotiating and misleading for deciding. Two markets can quote similar numbers and hand over very different amounts, because the deduction rate on a senior engineering salary ranges from 19% to 39% across the countries covered here.
The figures below take a typical mid-career salary in each market, roughly five to eight years of experience at a normal employer rather than at the highest paying handful, and run it through the local 2026 rules. Everything is then converted to euros a month so the columns can be read against each other.
The ranking
Federal tax only. State and provincial tax reduce both figures, in California and Ontario by roughly five to seven percent of gross. † Most of the Singaporean deduction is CPF, which remains yours. Currency conversions use approximate mid-market rates for July 2026: 1 EUR equals 0.86 GBP, 1.16 USD, 1.60 CAD, 1.77 AUD, 1.95 NZD, 0.93 CHF, 7.46 DKK, 11.0 SEK, 11.7 NOK, 176 JPY, 1.50 SGD and 3.80 ILS.
Gross pay does most of the work
The most striking thing about the table is how little of the ranking is decided by tax. Germany keeps 60.8% of an engineering salary and Spain keeps 73.5%, yet the German engineer finishes 873 euros a month ahead, because the German gross is 26,000 euros higher.
The same pattern repeats down the list. Italy has a lighter deduction rate than Germany, Finland or Sweden, and finishes last anyway. Denmark has the second heaviest deduction rate in the table and finishes sixth. Anyone choosing a market on tax rate alone is optimising the smaller variable.
Where the top three come apart
Switzerland leads by a distance and the figure needs two qualifications. Swiss health insurance is bought privately and is not a payroll deduction, costing an adult roughly CHF 300 to 450 a month before any family is added. Cantonal tax also varies enormously: the same salary produces very different bills in Zug and Geneva, a spread worked through in the cantonal comparison.
The American figure is federal only, and it excludes the two things that dominate a real American engineering package. Equity is the first: at larger employers, restricted stock can add 20% to 60% on top of base, taxed as ordinary income when it vests. Health insurance is the second, and the employee share of a family plan routinely exceeds $6,000 a year. The federal breakdown at a comparable salary is set out in what $100,000 leaves after tax.
Israel's position surprises people who have not looked at Tel Aviv salaries recently. Gross pay at senior levels in the local technology sector is high enough to survive a deduction rate above 33%, and section 102 share options receive capital gains treatment rather than income tax treatment, which is unusually generous. The detail is in Israeli tech pay after bituach leumi.
The expat regimes that change the answer
Three countries in the table offer arriving professionals a materially better deal than their residents receive, and none of it is reflected above.
- The Netherlands. The 30% ruling exempts a portion of gross salary from tax for up to sixty months, stepping down through 30%, 20% and 10%. On a 62,000 euro salary the opening phase is worth several hundred euros a month, as the guide to the ruling sets out.
- Italy. The impatriati regime exempts a large share of employment income for qualifying arrivals, which moves Italy from the bottom of this table to somewhere near the middle. How the regime works after the reform covers who still qualifies.
- Spain. The Beckham law applies a flat 24% to employment income up to 600,000 euros for six years, which for a well paid engineer is a substantial improvement on the progressive scale.
What the table cannot show
Three factors move the real ranking and none of them is a tax rule.
Housing. Zurich, Dublin, Amsterdam, Tel Aviv and the larger Californian metros absorb a share of net pay that Milan, Helsinki and Lisbon do not. A 40% housing cost ratio turns a 4,400 euro net into a 2,640 euro discretionary figure, and comparisons made before housing frequently reverse after it.
Employer contributions. An Australian employer pays 12% of salary into superannuation on top of the figures above. A Swedish employer pays 31.42% in social contributions. Neither shows up here, and both are real, as the guide to employer contributions explains.
Currency risk. Anyone earning in one currency and holding obligations in another has taken a position they may not have intended. What a weaker currency does to an otherwise strong salary is visible in Japanese pay and the exchange rate.
Run your own number rather than a typical one. The Germany Software Engineer, USA Software Engineer engineering pages break the ranges down by seniority, and every country calculator takes a custom figure.
Related: One salary, 22 tax systems