Teacher salaries, when adjusted for inflation, have declined in many European countries in recent years. Euronews Business looks at these trends over time.
Secondary classroom teacher recruitment in 2023/24 reached only half of its target in England, according to the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) report. Teaching was ranked as the best job in the UK for 2025 in hiring firm Indeed’s job postings. The shortage of teachers is also a widespread issue across the European Union (EU).
Is this result surprising? Not really. This is a highly complex issue with multiple contributing factors. Salary trends for teachers in real terms offer significant insights. In recent years, when adjusted for inflation, teacher salaries have been declining in many European countries, including England, Ireland, Italy, Greece, and Finland.
So, how have teacher salaries changed in Europe since the 2000s? Over the last decade, which countries have experienced the highest increases and sharpest declines in teacher salaries in real terms?
Salaries fell in nearly half of countries over 8 years
Among 22 countries and regions, the statutory salaries of lower secondary teachers in real terms declined in 10 of them between 2015 and 2023, with some experiencing significant decreases, according to the OECD’s Education at a Glance 2024 report.
Salaries saw the sharpest decline in Luxembourg, dropping by 11% during this period, followed by a 9% decrease in Greece and a 6% decline in Ireland, Finland, and Italy.
Salaries also fell by 5% in England, 4% in Portugal, and 3% in Hungary between 2015 and 2023.
The increase was 4% on average in the EU-25, while it was lower in some of the EU’s top economies, such as Spain (2%) and Germany and Italy (1%).
Conversely, Turkey recorded the highest increase, with teacher salaries rising by 31%. Czechia followed with a 16% increase, and Scotland saw a 12% rise, making them the only regions with increases exceeding 10%.
Between 2013 and 2023, a similar trend emerged. Greece topped the list for the largest decrease at 12%, followed by Luxembourg (10%) and Ireland, Finland, and Italy (7%). In England, teacher salaries dropped by 5% in real terms as well.
Teacher salaries in Hungary rose by nearly 50% in 2014 compared with 2013, measured in US dollars. This significant increase strongly impacts the results when analysing changes over time. The line chart below illustrates this pattern clearly.
While salaries declined by 3% in Hungary between 2015 and 2023, the overall increase from 2013 to 2023 was an impressive 45%. This places Hungary at the top of the list for the largest salary increases during this period, followed by Turkey at 37%.
Czechia and Slovakia experienced notable increases of 18% over the past 10 years, with Scotland following closely with an 11% rise.
Among the EU’s largest economies, Germany reported the highest increase at 7%, followed by France at 4% during the same period.
Change in teacher salaries since 2005
Looking at changes over a longer period, such as between 2005 and 2023, Greece experienced a dramatic decline in teacher salaries. Teachers in Greece lost a third of their salaries in real terms during this period, a decrease of 33%. Significant declines were also observed in Portugal (13%), as well as in Italy and England (both 12%).
Although the decreases were smaller, salaries also declined in Spain and Finland (both 5%) and France (2%).
Between 2005 and 2023, Turkey saw a significant increase in teacher salaries, with a reported rise of 59%. Poland (28%), Germany (16%), and Norway (15%) followed Turkey, though with lower rates of increase.
The line charts above and below illustrate that teacher salaries in real terms began to decline in many countries following the COVID-19 pandemic. This trend is also evident in the EU-25 average.
Looking closely at England in real terms, with 2015 indexed to 100, a noticeable decline emerges following the Covid-19 pandemic. For example, teacher salaries reached 101 in 2020 and 102 in 2021 during the pandemic but dropped to 97 in 2022 and 95 in 2023 when adjusted for inflation. This indicates that teachers’ purchasing power has declined over the past two years compared to the pandemic era.
According to the NFER report, 44% more teachers had stated they intended to leave teaching in 2022/23 than in the previous year. In 2024/25, 10 out of 17 secondary subjects are forecast to under-recruit.
Which countries pay teachers the best?
Teacher salaries vary significantly across Europe, with qualifications and experience playing a key role in differences within each country.
According to the European Commission’s Eurydice, annual gross statutory salaries for starting teachers in 2022/23 ranged from €9,897 in Poland to €84,589 in Luxembourg within the EU.
German teachers earn nearly double those in France
Teachers in Germany (€62,322) earned nearly double the salaries of their counterparts in France (€32,186). Spain (€36,580) was slightly above France, while Italy (€27,079) fell below.
Teachers in the EU candidate countries earn less than €12,000 in a year.
Teacher salaries adjusted for purchasing power
Teacher salaries expressed in Purchasing Power Standards (PPS) allow for a fairer comparison. PPS is an artificial currency unit that reflects the same purchasing power across countries, meaning one PPS can theoretically buy the same amount of goods and services in any country.
Annual gross statutory salaries in PPS for starting teachers within the EU ranged from 11,826 in Slovakia to 49,015 in Luxembourg. While the gaps between countries are narrower, they still persist.
In this indicator, several EU countries reported lower salaries than some candidate countries.
OECD noted that salary levels for teachers are just one of several determinants of the attractiveness of the teaching profession. It underlined the importance of providing more professional development opportunities and ensuring the profession remains intellectually stimulating throughout teachers’ careers.
Jack Worth, School Workforce Lead at NFER, also emphasised the urgent need for ambitious, radical, and cost-effective policy actions to tackle teacher recruitment and retention challenges. “Teacher supply is in a critical state, which risks the quality of education that children and young people receive,” he added.
