Fahd Amer Al-Ahmadi
Al-Riyadh
I read recently that an Egyptian has to work 353 hours to save enough money to be able to buy an iPhone 6. In comparison, someone in Switzerland only has to work 21 hours. These statistics are according to a report issued by the Egypt-based Baseera Research Center. Undoubtedly, there is a large difference between the two countries in terms of the number of working hours needed to be able to buy the same phone.
I compared these numbers with other countries and this is what I found. A Ukrainian needs to work 627 hours to buy an iPhone 6, an Indonesian and Kenyan 468 hours, an Indian 360 hours, a Chinese 218 hours, a Russian 158 hours and a Thai 150 hours. In these countries, an average employee works for eight hours a day.
In some cities, people do not need to work many hours to save enough money to buy an iPhone. In Geneva, an employee needs to work only 22 hours, in New York 24 hours, and Miami and Los Angeles 27 hours.
The minimum salary for Saudis working in the private sector is SR3,000 a month. The iPhone 6 (32GB) costs SR3,199; this means that a Saudi who works as a security guard should work 256 hours to be able to buy an iPhone.
The iPhone is cited as an example to show the difference in people’s incomes around the world. I do not see why we cannot use a sack of rice, a piece of soap, or a gallon of cooking oil to compare the income difference in certain countries. For example, a bus driver in Bangladesh needs to work three hours to buy a sack of rice while in Sweden a bus driver needs to work 20 minutes.
An Indian bus driver needs to work a full hour to buy a bottle of Pepsi while in Spain and Italy an employee needs to work six minutes. A waiter in Austria can buy 12 bottles if he works for an hour while a Bolivian waiter needs to work 12 hours to buy the same amount. A Saudi security guard needs to work 256 hours to buy an iPhone while a spoiled child can get it as a gift from his rich parents.
