Income tax about what it is in CA? I'll take your word for it. What about all the other taxes? Car tax, VAT, etc?
From what I've seen purchasing power is much lower in Norway. $50K would go much further in US, Canada, UK than Norway.
From what I've seen purchasing power is much lower in Norway. $50K would go much further in US, Canada, UK than Norway.
* 25% VAT on everything except food, which is 12%. Electric vehicles currently exempt
* 40% income tax on average including 8% public pension contribution. Highest marginal tax on income is 47%, which applies to incomes greater than $116k.
* Employer has to pay 14% of your salary as employment tax. Company profits are taxed at 24% (this is separate from the capital gains tax). Stock-based compensation is taxed as income, so no possibility of weaseling around the employment tax. You won't get stock-based compensation unless you're in a startup or a C-class executive at a (big) private company. The wealth tax does weird things to the valuation of stock options; they'll almost always be worthless unless your company is sold or goes public.
* Net assets above ~$175k are taxed at 0.85% p.a, primary residence contributes only 25% of its market value to net assets
* 29% capital gains tax, primary residence is exempt as is most tax income from renting out primary residence. Sell your home with $1 million profit? No tax.
* On average ~$10k tax on all new motor vehicles, electric vehicles currently exempt
* A tax of approximately 30% (~5 NOK per liter) is applied to gasoline, in addition to the 25% VAT. Annual tax of ~$1000 on all motor vehicles, increasing with how good the vehicle is. Electric vehicles currently exempt.
* Various taxes on alcohol, tobacco, air travel. Some municipalities have a property tax on the order of ~$500 p.a. for an average residence.
I've eyeballed most of the currency conversions.
Norwegian income tax is subject to a lot of deductions, so in practice people will never pay the full whack. In fact the average income tax has been estimated to be under 30% http://www.smartepenger.no/skatt/653-skatteprosenter-pa-lonn... (Norwegian language article)