Ireland
Latest Average Wage
−2.8% · 5 years
$70,113
Country Comparison
Ireland vs Australia
Compare average wages, long-term wage changes and eight consumer price categories using OECD data.
At a Glance
Ireland
vs
Australia
$70,1132025
Latest Average Wage
Australia +2.7%
(vs Ireland)
$72,0182025
−2.8%2025
5-Year Wage Change
Australia +1.4 pts
(vs Ireland)
−1.4%2025
+4.6%2025
10-Year Wage Change
Ireland +2.4 pts
(vs Australia)
+2.2%2025
92.22024
Overall Price Level
Australia +0.5 index points
(vs Ireland)
92.72024
Wages are PPP-adjusted average annual wages; price levels use the United States reference of 100. Years shown are each country's latest reported observation.
How Wages Have Changed
Follow PPP-adjusted average annual wages in constant prices across both economies.
USD PPP, constant prices · missing years shown as gaps, never interpolated
Australia
Latest Average Wage
−1.4% · 5 years
$72,018
Wage Milestones
Ireland
10 Years Ago
$67,039 (2015)
Historical Peak
$72,356 (2021)
Latest Wage
$70,113 (2025)
Australia
10 Years Ago
$70,450 (2015)
Historical Peak
$73,870 (2021)
Latest Wage
$72,018 (2025)
Compare Everyday Price Levels
See how eight consumer price categories compare with the United States reference value of 100.
United States = 100 · Differences shown in index points
Ireland (IRL)Australia (AUS)
Overall
−0.5 index points
100
92.2vs92.7
Food
−2.9 index points
100
98.1vs101
Clothing
+19.2 index points
100
88.7vs69.5
Housing
+12.2 index points
100
104vs91.8
Health
−2.5 index points
100
84.4vs86.9
Transport
+14.7 index points
100
114vs99.3
Recreation
−3.2 index points
100
92vs95.2
Restaurants & Accommodation
−10.0 index points
100
105vs115
What Stands Out
01
Latest Wage Gap
Australia's latest average wage is $72,018 for 2025, about 2.7% higher than Ireland's $70,113 for 2025 — computed straight from the two reported values. Per year, that works out to roughly $1,906 on the shared purchasing-power basis.
02
Stronger Recent Trend
On the latest one-year change, Ireland shows the stronger movement at +1.8%, against +1.1% for Australia. The five-year horizon reverses the ordering — Ireland at −2.8% and Australia at −1.4% — so the latest year is not the whole story. Both percentages are real, PPP-adjusted changes from the reported wage series.
03
Largest Price Gap
Clothing shows the widest price gap of the comparable categories in 2024: 88.7 for Ireland against 69.5 for Australia. Ireland sits on the higher side of that 19.2-point spread; Australia reads 19.2 index points lower on the US=100 scale. Index points are not percentages; the two scales answer different questions.
04
Closest Price Category
The closest category is Overall: Ireland reads 92.2 and Australia 92.7 for 2024, just 0.5 index points apart on the US=100 scale. The next closest is Health at 2.5 index points apart. Closeness here describes the index readings only, not the baskets behind them.
Understanding the Comparison
Wage Position
Ireland and Australia report nearly the same PPP-adjusted average annual wage: $72,018 for 2025, against $70,113 for 2025. The difference is 2.7% in relative terms — a percentage calculated from the two reported values — or roughly $1,906 a year, which is small next to either figure. No extra conversion is needed here: each figure is already a purchasing-power-adjusted annual amount in constant prices. Over ten years Ireland recorded +4.6% and Australia +2.2%, so the two series have been moving in the same long-term direction. For most side-by-side readings the two wage levels can be treated as equivalent within this dataset.
Wage Direction
Both wage series decline over the five-year horizon, though not at the same pace. Ireland is partway through a recovery: the latest year added +1.8%, though the level remains 3.1% below its peak. Australia shows no single direction across horizons: +1.1% over one year against −1.4% over five. The shared direction still leaves room for different speeds: −2.8% for Ireland against −1.4% for Australia, so the distance between the two levels keeps shifting. All changes here are measured in real, PPP-adjusted terms, so they describe purchasing-power movement rather than nominal pay increases.
Price Profile
Ireland's overall consumer price level for 2024 reads 92.2, and Australia's reads 92.7, each measured against the United States reference of 100. Neither country is uniformly higher: Ireland leads in 3 of the 8 comparable categories and Australia in 4, so the profile splits by category rather than by country. The widest separation is in Clothing: 88.7 for Ireland against 69.5 for Australia, a gap of 19.2 index points. At the other end, Overall brings the two closest — 92.2 versus 92.7, a gap of just 0.5 index points. Relative to the US benchmark, Ireland reads above 100 in 3 of its 8 reported categories, and Australia in 2 of its 8.
Wage and price data should not be combined into a verdict on which country is better to live in.
