One of the existing pillars of jobs and employment is the payment of wages. Across the world, various people are in paid employment and receive remuneration considered commensurate with their overall input and contribution to the organizations.
To ensure some sort of balance and fairness, several governments and institutions have advocated for and established minimum wages barriers and work hour limits to ensure that labour is neither unfairly paid nor overworked.
While a majority of the deal is grappling with the realities of minimum wages and various levels of disposable income, a certain class of people are on another wavelength entirely. Cynics will argue that they are paid to kick a ball but purists will say they are custodians of the beautiful game. Indeed professional, elite footballers are some of the world’s most handsomely compensated employees and every year while national labour organizations and unions fight for a higher margin for the minimum wage, professional elite footballers are locked in high-level contract negotiation as they seek to maximize their talent.
To determine just how much of a margin exists between these elite footballers and everyday employees, here’s a comparative analysis of the annual wages of certain elite footballers and the average annual income in some of Africa’s biggest economies.
Nigeria’s relatively newly rebased economy is adjudged the continent’s biggest yet the established minimum wage in the West African nation is 18,000 naira- about $82. Given, many earn salaries far above the minimum wage limit but the truth is that a majority of the citizens in the country earn closer to the minimum wage than astronomical figures. In comparison with Argentina and Manchester United’s Angel Di Maria, who earns £14,600,000 per year, it could take a minimum wage earner 8064 years to earn Angel Di Maria’s annual salary. On the other hand, it would take Di Maria less than a minute to earn a minimum wage earner’s weekly salary.
In Algeria, the minimum wage is reportedly set at around 18,000 dinars per month. Over the course of a year, a minimum pay earner will take home as much as 216,000 dinars. In comparison, Colombian star Radamel earns £13,800,000 per year and will earn a typical annual Algerian wage in only four minutes. Many Algerians will be hoping that their own Yacine Brahimi, currently the star man at Falcao’s former club Porto, will follow the same career trajectory and earn big bucks.
In Egypt, average yearly wage is EGP20,500 per year. Only three months ago, Egypt had a player, Mohammed Salah, lining up alongside Eden Hazard at Chelsea. Hazard, one of Belgium’s best ever players, earns a staggering £10,400,000 per year and will earn a typical weekly salary in Egypt in just 8 minutes.
In Angola, average annual pay is estimated at around 180,000 Kwanza. In comparison, Gareth Bale earns €20,000,000 per year and it would take him less than a minute to earn an Angolan’s weekly salary.
Finally, in Ivory Coast annual take is around 444,000 francs. In comparison, one of Ivory Coast most famous sons, Yaya Toure, earns £11,100,000 per year. It would take the Manchester City star less than one minute to earn an Ivorian’s weekly salary. Also, Wilfried Bony- who lines up alongside Toure at Manchester City- earns £5,200,000 per year. It would Bony 3 minutes to earn an Ivorian’s weekly salary.
Clearly, these wages are unbelievably high but paying clubs have factored these cost into their annual budget plans and more importantly excel in leveraging the brand appeal of these player in various marketing drives to ensure that these immense amounts are recouped.
For example, Cristiano Ronaldo earns €18,200,000 per year at Real Madrid but the club will make a tidy amount from leveraging Ronaldo image rights and marketing appeal. A simple example is through merchandizing. Cristiano Ronaldo’s yearly salary is equivalent to the cost of 196,226 Real Madrid replica jerseys with ‘Ronaldo’ printed on the back which are sold for €92.75. Typically Real Madrid average sales of about 1.5 million replica jerseys per year thus raking in up to £60 million from that revenue stream alone.
Whilst the salaries of footballers are already significantly high, analysts expect that these wages will only keep going up. Deloitte pegged the average wage for Premier League players at £1.6 million during the 2012-13 season and the total wage bill of the Premier League in the same year was £1.8 billion. The year after that, the wage bill total in the Premier League had increased to £2.2 billion per year.
It is undeniable; top-level footballers enjoy many perks that come with playing for a globally recognized football club and considering the kinds of salaries they command, they are truly elite and in more ways than one.
