Chart love: How most people earn less than the average

The eternal rage about the statistical bureau's 'fabricated facts'

That’s a recurring theme every month. The statistical bureau publishes fresh income stats and people get upset about 'these fabricated facts’, as ‘everyone we know has lower wages’. Fun fact: both can be true at the same time. People indeed earn less, while the figures can be true.

Gross wages are on the X-axis. The gross average salary for the period is the red signpost. The gross median wage for the period is the light blue bar. Wages on the extreme right can be extremely high, tilting the average. And the statistical bureau sets up its methodology in a way that only calculates with full-time workers, at companies with more than 5 employees, etc - leaving out employees who would negatively impact the results.