Did you earn more money last year? These figures claim you did

According to the latest report from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) we all earned more money last year. Time for a quick with the boss I think.

Most of us stopped looking at our payslips a while ago. With more deductions than a box set of Sherlock Holmes, it is usually just flung into a drawer while we hope for the best that there’s enough in the ATM to pay the bills.

But the lads in charge of keeping track of this sort of stuff, the CSO, have just told us that we all earned more last year, €238 a year to be precise.

The Irish Independent reports the figures today and it confirms that the average worker in Ireland now earns €36,071 a year, up from €35,833 last year. One very interesting point is the difference between the public and private sector.

The average private sector worker earns €32,338, up 1.5 per cent on last year. As for the public sector, they earn €47,568 a year, up 2 per cent.

Of course, both figures contain extremes. Just as some highly paid civil servants cancel out many ordinary nurse, teacher and guard salaries, the likes of Michael O’Leary and other well-paid CEOs should affect the private sector number. That said, the gap between the two is still larger than you would have expected.

But the reason for the extra money is not down to more generous bosses as hourly pay has fallen slightly, meaning that we are all working more hours to make the same, or slightly more, money. Even so, the average number of working hours in the country is 31 a week.

The other headline figure is the drop in public service number, down 5 per cent to 386,300.

Of course, these numbers don’t take into consideration all the taxes and charges and levies that come out of our wages so even if you do work a bit more, you are probably still taking home a little bit less.