My SF based colleagues with the same job title were making 250k USD (so 202k GBP).
We sat down one day and compared our household budgets line by line and in the end we estimated that 'money left over' for equivalent house, medical and kids education my American colleagues were slightly better off, but maybe only by 5-10k USD per year.
Anecdatally ...
It's also hard to compare things 1:1 - since the NHS is "free" (via taxation), but it doesn't cover dentistry at all really whereas equivalent good US health insurances will do.
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/percentile-points-f...
With respect to VAT, it nudges my total tax paid up about 4 percentage points. Total, including VAT, NI, and council tax is still well below 50%.
Remember, you're not going to spend nearly all of your pre tax earnings on VAT rated goods and services, given you pay tax and housing andany other things which does not incur VAT.
Even so, you need to get up towards 300k GBP/year to exceed 50% even with the payroll tax. And that assumes you're making zero pension contributions (as contributions are offset against your tax up to 40k gross/year)
With respect to student loans, sure, you can add that in but then you need to do that when comparing to the US salary levels in this thread too.
Even so, as noted, you'd not hit 50% even with payroll taxes at anywhere near the income levels stated. At the stated 100k GBP contracted salary, your "salary" including payroll tax would be 113,207 GBP, and your total tax wedge would be 41% (compared to 33% combined income tax and NI).
For a while, the strong pound made it seem like people in the U.K. were well paid compared to most developed countries (not the US which tends to have higher pay than basically any other medium or large country) but I think this was mostly just the strong pound and purchasing power wasn’t much higher in the U.K.
The pound has fallen a lot in the last decade and I think various numbers like pay have been somewhat sticky and not really gone up to match the increased cost of imports.
To attempt to make a comparison, if you live in central London vs Manhattan, tax rates will be comparable (maybe more so if you double both gross salaries), rents in Manhattan will be something like 2x (probably more) based on apartment type but you’ll potentially get something bigger/nicer in NY (ie partly it is about a difference in the average unit, but if all you can get is a large apartment, you have to pay for all of it so controlling for such qualities isn’t so relevant). Rent controls mean that the supply of apartments is less than might be expected based on the number of housing units In Manhattan. Groceries (in Manhattan) are more expensive, as are things like restaurants. The comparison doesn’t feel totally crazy to me.
Other US cities may be different though, eg I don’t know how the taxes/rent would work out in SF or the Bay Area or Seattle or Chicago. There isn’t really much of an alternative to London in the U.K. in the same way that there are many ‘top’ cities in the US and tax policy is much more uniform between locations.
As for the tax, we have progressive taxation in the UK. Earning £100k, you'd pay 0% on the first 12.5k, 25% on the next 70k or so, and 45% on the last 27.5k (numbers are from memory so they might be a little off). High wage earners are not giving up half their income in tax. That'd be silly.
Basic rate of 20% on earnings between £12,571 and £50,270.
Higher Rate of 40% on earnings between £50,271 and £125,139.
Additional Rate of 45% on earnings from £125,140.
Then there's NI which is effectively tax too but isn't listed in the bands above. Someone on £150k is paying 40% tax and NI (total, not marginal). Not quite half but it's now low either.
Personal Allowance Up to £12,570 0%
Starter rate £12,571 to £14,732 19%
Basic rate £14,733 to £25,688 20%
Intermediate rate £25,689 to £43,662 21%
Higher rate £43,663 to £150,000 41%
Top rate over £150,000 46%
You hit 33% income tax + NI at 100k (see listentotaxman.com)
Most things I purchase have no tax - food, housing, train fares.
The oil for this winter heating cost £1500 plus £75 vat.
It seems fairly unlikely to me as UK tax and NI would be around 50% plus everything you purchase has 20% VAT. Sure medical insurance in the US is insane but surely that doesn't quite cover it.