Cyprus income inequality exceeds EU average as earnings gaps persist

Cyprus income inequality figures reflect significant sectoral and gender pay gapsCyprus recorded an income inequality coefficient of 31.2 in 2025, above the European Union average of 29.2, according to figures published by Eurostat on Friday. At the same time, separate earnings figures from the Cyprus Statistical Service (Cystat) highlight significant differences in pay across the island. The Eurostat figure suggests that income was distributed less equally in Cyprus than across the EU as a whole, although the bloc’s overall level of inequality edged down from 29.4 in 2024. Meanwhile, the Cyprus Statistical Service’s 2025 earnings figures reveal substantial gaps between average and median pay, differences between men and women, and considerable variations across economic sectors and nationalities. The Gini coefficient measures how evenly income is distributed across a population, using a scale from zero to 100. A score of zero represents perfect equality, where everyone receives the same income, while a score of 100 indicates complete inequality, where one person receives all the income. Cyprus’ score of 31.2 was slightly below Greece’s 31.6, while Turkey recorded a considerably higher coefficient of 43.9. Across the EU, income inequality varied considerably between member states, with the Gini coefficient ranging from 23.0 in Slovakia to 37.7 in Bulgaria. Slovakia recorded the most equal income distribution among EU countries in 2025, followed by Belgium at 23.4, the Czech Republic at 24.0, Slovenia at 24.6 and Poland at 24.9. At the other end of the scale, Bulgaria had the highest income inequality, with a coefficient of 37.7, followed by Latvia at 35.6 and Lithuania at 35.5. The EU’s overall score of 29.2 represented a modest improvement on the previous year, indicating a slight move towards a more equal distribution of income across the bloc. Cyprus’ earnings figures show a substantial gap between average and typical pay. According to Cystat, average gross monthly earnings stood at €2,591 in 2025, compared with median earnings of €1,953, leaving a difference of €638. The average was approximately 33 per cent higher than the median, a gap that points to the influence of higher salaries in lifting the overall average above the amount earned by the middle employee. The distribution of earnings also showed that nearly a quarter of employees earned less than €1,500 per month. Some 24.2 per cent of employees fell into this category, while the largest single earnings bracket was €1,000 to €1,249, which accounted for 13 per cent of employees. Gender differences were also apparent in the distribution of salaries, with women more heavily represented in the lower-paid brackets between €1,000 and €1,499 per month. Men, meanwhile, had a 3.1 percentage point advantage in the highest earnings bracket, comprising employees earning €6,000 or more per month. Pay also varied sharply between economic sectors, with average monthly earnings ranging from €956 in agriculture to €5,038 in financial and insurance activities. This difference highlights the extent to which the sector in which someone works can influence their earnings, with average pay in financial and insurance activities more than five times the agricultural figure. Nationality was another dividing line in the earnings data, with Cypriot employees recording median monthly earnings of €2,145, compared with €1,597 among non-Cypriots. The figures also showed particularly wide variations in average earnings among non-Cypriot employees, ranging from €664 in agriculture to €6,649 in financial and insurance activities. The data therefore points to considerable differences within the workforce, both in the typical salary received by Cypriot and non-Cypriot employees and in the earnings available across different sectors. Eurostat’s indicator refers to the distribution of equivalised disposable income per inhabitant, which takes account of household size and composition to make income levels more comparable between households. The measure assesses income inequality rather than the absolute level of income or the overall wealth of a country. Taken together, the European and national figures provide different perspectives on income disparities in Cyprus, with Eurostat measuring inequality in disposable income across the population and Cystat’s earnings data illustrating differences in gross pay between employee groups.