The countries with the highest salaries for pharma and biotech professionals

A new survey finds that Denmark is the top paying country for people in pharma

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Leila Hawkins
Leila Hawkins
09/23/2022

Two scientists analyzing sample

Pharmaceutical companies have been reporting labor shortages since the Covid-19 pandemic, driven by a mixture of increased demand for products and services and the need for new technical skills as the industry continues to transition to Pharma 4.0.

Simultaneously, rising costs are forcing businesses to squeeze their budgets while many countries are battling a cost-of-living crisis. Along with the shift to remote working, people are contemplating moving to work in different sectors, or considering whether they could earn a higher salary if they worked abroad.

With this in mind, online legal networking service Upcounsel commissioned a survey to compare the average salary of medical and pharmaceutical professionals across the US and different countries in Europe and Oceania to determine where they would earn the most money.

The survey found that Denmark was one of the highest-paying countries for pharmaceutical professionals, paying the highest wage for people in the R&D sector and ranking third for pharmaceutical manufacturing. The US, Switzerland and Germany all feature in the top five countries paying the highest salary for these two areas, while Denmark is also the top country for professionals in the medical devices sector.

By comparison, Turkey has some of the lowest salaries with an average wage in pharmaceutical manufacturing of US$5,000 a year. The UK is also among the worst countries for wages, paying $39,000 a year on average. 

The survey was created by analyzing salaries from 20 countries across 66 different sectors. The cost of living and rent index was recorded for each and used to determine salaries.

Denmark is the top paying country for professionals in pharmaceutical research and development (R&D): 

Switzerland pays the highest salary to professionals in pharmaceutical manufacturing:

Upcounsel also highlighted the requirements for professionals wanting to move overseas. These include financial stability and obtaining a visa, via a business, study, internship, family reunion, or on a guest scientist basis.

 For the results full results visit Upcounsel’s survey on salaries.

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