Mayoral salary: a ranking of earnings of Ukrainian mayors appeared for the first year of the war

Ukraine, the onset of full-scale military invasion by Russia led to a sharp decrease in the incomes of many Ukrainian families. At the same time, there remains a significant group of politicians in the country who receive substantial salaries.

The publication “Slovo I Dilo” collected data on the salaries of mayors of regional centers of Ukraine for the first year of the war.

The ranking of mayoral salaries was topped by the annual earnings of the mayor of Kharkiv, Igor Terekhov. In 2022, the mayor of Kharkiv received 1,714.9 thousand hryvnias (almost 42 thousand euros). In the pre-war 2021, he earned 112 thousand less (2,739 euros).

The second position with earnings of 1,387.8 thousand hryvnias (about 33,938 euros) was occupied by the mayor of Cherkasy, Anatoliy Bondarenko. In 2021, his salary was significantly lower – only 998.2 thousand hryvnias (about 24,411 euros).

The top three leaders were rounded out by the mayor of Lutsk, Igor Polyshchuk. He received 1,054.5 thousand hryvnias (25,788 euros) in 2022. However, this amount is slightly less than his earnings in 2021, which were 1,138.8 thousand hryvnias (27,849 euros).

The rest of the mayoral earnings did not reach one million hryvnias. For example, in fourth place with an official income of 966.1 thousand hryvnias (23,626 euros) was the mayor of Dnipro, Boris Filatov. Only the fifth position in the ranking went to the capital mayor, Vitali Klitschko. He earned 906.3 thousand hryvnias (22,163 euros) in his position in 2022.

The remaining annual mayoral earnings ranged from 285.6 thousand hryvnias (6,984 euros) to 862.6 thousand hryvnias (21,095 euros). As seen from this ranking, mayoral salary does not depend on the population size of the city. For example, the lowest salary belonged to the mayor of the million-strong city of Odesa, Gennadiy Trukhanov, who ranked 22nd in the rating. Meanwhile, the mayor of Ternopil, Serhiy Nadal, ranked 6th with a salary of 862.6 thousand hryvnias (21,095 euros). Interestingly, Lviv Mayor Andriy Sadovyi only ranked 8th.

In the bottom three positions of the least paid city leaders, besides Trukhanov, were also the mayor of Kherson, Halyna Lugova (339 thousand hryvnias – about 8,290 euros), and the mayor of Poltava, Oleksandr Mamai (351.9 thousand hryvnias – about 8,606 euros).

It is worth recalling that if our Western partners do not provide us with money, Ukraine will face a severe budget crisis in just 2-3 months and there will be no money to pay salaries.