Bureaucrat Salary Leaderboard: Which departments are taking home the most cash?

Public servants are now paid $17,600 more a year than people in the private sector, and every single government department has a higher average salary than private-sector New Zealanders.

To make it worse, bureaucrats' salaries are also growing quicker. Between 2020 and 2025, departments' average salaries rose 21.37 percent, almost fifty percent more than the 14.49 percent growth in the private sector over the same period.

More bureaucrats being paid more money means more debt for taxpayers. 

*Public service salaries were taken from the Public Service Commission's 'Wage Trends' data, available here.

Public Service Dashboard Data