The results of an annual survey on average wages conducted by the Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) showed airline pilots and navigators topping the list, while servers at restaurants occupied the bottom tier.
The findings, released yesterday, came from data compiled last year.
The average monthly wage for the top 20 professions on the list was NT$70,939, a 1.16 percent increase from the previous year.
The average wage for the bottom 20 professions, meanwhile, was NT$21,949, a 3.2 percent decrease from the previous year, the council and the Bureau of Statistics said.
Workers in the highest-paying jobs -- aircraft pilots and navigators -- had an average monthly wage of NT$208,142, or more than 14 times the average salary of workers in the least-paying job -- restaurant workers -- at NT$14,407 a month.
Rounding up the top-five list were certified actuaries, with a salary of NT$135,056, medical doctors at NT$125,090, ocean vessel managers at NT$106,465 and ore and mineral smelters at NT$100,362 per month.
Lawyers fell from 8th place in 2005 to 21st last year.
The most poorly paid workers after restaurant servers were beverage and bar workers at NT$15,434, gas station attendants at NT$16,036, glass installers at NT$16,036 and miscellaneous kitchen workers at NT$18,017.
Tan Wen-lin (
"The highest-paying jobs are the ones requiring some combination of high levels of professionalism, a long period of training, heavy responsibilities and high risk," Tan said. "Some blue-collar jobs pay very well while many white-collar workers are paid poorly."
As the survey asked businesses to reveal how much they paid their employees, some of the highest-paid professionals may have been excluded, Tan said.
"We cannot get data on independent doctors, only on those who work for other doctors or institutions," Tan said.
"The salaries of other professionals, such as lawyers, are also difficult to determine because they are in the employ of many companies simultaneously," Tan said.
The fact that many of the less-paying jobs were held by part-time workers also affected the results.
"Students or women who have housework and childcare duties usually work part-time and choose jobs in restaurants or in the service sector," Tan said. "As they only work a few hours a week, their wage is correspondingly low."
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