How are the average salary in Mexico and in Cancun.

I have been always doing research on myself, but don't get enough info with whats the real deal. I hear that paychecks in Mexico for a bank employee are like the same as for a McDonald worker in America.

Cancun is a nice place, but to work there sucks, as the paychecks are low for the many hours people are working for. People want to money and be valued. No one wants to be low valued. And I can't anyone imagine, wanting to spend their in Cancun to pay only bills and have no money to spend like most in America for entertainment or other non-necessary things.http://www.milenio.com/df/salario_minimo-America_Latina-salarios-OCDE-salario_minimo_mexicano_MILIMA20140805_0368_3.jpg

I wanted to know what the real average paycheck is, based the person is having a bachelors degree. Share only if the source is up-to-date or reliable

Please mention currency being paid with, and if meant monthly or yearly paid.

Thanks for anyone's collaboration in advance.

Well that graphic is OUTDATED. The graphic you are showing is from 2014.
No one here in Mexico earns the official minimum wage, it is just taken as a reference.
I dont know if you have visited Mexico but things here are much cheaper than in Europe, I know this because I lived for one year in England and visited Germany and other countries.
Of course the salaries here in Mexico are lower in comparison to Europe and the US and that is because the cost of living here is lower,  if the government increases the salary all prices will hike up in consecuence, which is bad. Argentina has the higher minimun wage in Latin America but prices there are super expensive because of the inflation. Argentines say that in Mexico they could have a lower salary but they would be able to buy more things than in their country.

The real minimum wage that a person without a university education can earn is around 285 USD, working 48 hours a week.
With the official minimun wage that would be 115 USD, but no one really earns it.

I don't know Cancun but in other cities in Mexico you could see these prices:
You can rent a 2 bedroom house for 110 USD/month.
A cinema ticket costs = 2.5 USD.
A kg of good meat =  6.6 USD.
Local transport one way ticket = 0.41 USD.
Fruits and vegetables are very cheap as Mexico is a great producer.
You can have a good Mexican meal including beer or coke for 4.4 USD.
Gasoline (1 liter) = 0.85 USD.

Hope it gives you an idea.

That 285 is for a week or a month?  Pesos or dollars? And thanks for the information

You did say usd. Sorry for asking when you did explain that .

Susan, you have to understand that the Mexican peso is very devalued against the dollar, so, when you convert a Mexican salary, which is in pesos, to dollars you are going to get a very unfavorable change, therefore you will have the perspective that it is a very low salary (from the American perspective). For example, in January 2017 the peso had the worst performance in many years, for every dollar you got around 21 pesos. Right now (June 2017) you get 17.5 pesos.
The real minimun wage is 5000 pesos/month so in January that was 238 USD/month, now that is 285 USD/month. It's a difference of almost 50 USD in 5 months, in Mexico that amount is a lot, believe it or not.

Some years ago, for every dollar you got 10 pesos, if that rate had been maintained until today, then the salary would be 500 USD per month, but nowadays the peso doesn't have the value it should have.

I understand the exchange rate .  We were in Oaxaca in 2013 and the rate was $12 pesos to a dollar.  We were in Jalisco last  January .  The rate was 20 pesos to a dollar.  I check it routinely as I explore living in Mexico .  When you said that average salary was 285 dollars, you did not specify for what period of time.  When we were visiting Oaxaca , we were told a school teacher only earned the equivalent of $50 a week.  Not liveable even there.

50 USD a week? that would be 875 pesos per week (17.5:1) or 1000 pesos per week (20:1). It's a big difference.
Anyway, that would be the salary for a cashier in other parts of Mexico. Oaxaca is one of the 3 poorest states.
In my state, teachers earn 150 USD (17.5:1) per week. Which is not that bad considering the cost of living here in my state.

The MX federally mandated minimum wage is approx 85 MXN/ day. A MX work day can be 8-12 hrs.  In the US, depending on the local it can be 8-15 USD / hr.

One way to compare apples to apples is to compare the local buying power of a local "unit" of currency.  In MX a person can earn 1000 units a week.  Rent = 250 units/week. Bus to work 96 units. Tomatoes 12 units / lb. Pork chop 30 units / lb. Hamburger 25 units /lb. Coka cola 10/ units/ 12 oz.

You can see the high cost of living for MX. 

For similar items in the US compare the cost in "units" of USD.

If you have have a minimum of 2000 USD at an exchange rate of 16+ and don't live in the three major metropolitan areas (MX City, Guadalajara, Monterrey). Even the city of Cancun is inexpensive. Just like Vegas stay away from the tourist zone.

The website Numbeo makes comparisons easy.  Let me know if you think they are correct.

Susan McCrary wrote:

The website Numbeo makes comparisons easy.  Let me know if you think they are correct.


Based on my personal experienceand since I live/travelled Mexico since 2003 I can say the values in Numbeo are quite accurate but you could also find informations on construction cost on various official government site, just like in Canada they have stats in Mexico.

Buen dia, GyC.