Employee Cost Calculator

Written byOleh Soloninupdated 5 October 2026

Gross salary

Payroll contributions, %

Benefits a month

Workplace a month

Rent, hardware, software, connectivity.

Holiday days a year

Hours in a working day

Result

A month$143,000.00
A year$1,716,000.00
An hour of work$979.45
Of that, contributions$30,000.00
Everything above the salary$43,000.00
Times the salary1.43

The salary is about two thirds of it

Calculates what an employee actually costs a company once contributions, benefits and the workplace are added to the salary.

Payroll contributions alone add around thirty percent to a salary before anything else. Then come the benefits, the desk, the laptop, the software licences and the share of the rent — none of which appears on the employment contract.

The number worth knowing is the ratio: how many times the salary the person really costs. Once you have it, an hourly figure follows, and with it a way to price work and to see what an hour of meeting costs.

How to use

Enter the gross salary — before tax, not what lands in the bank.
Give employer contributions as a percentage of salary.
Enter benefits and workplace costs for the month — hardware, desk, software, training; divide yearly amounts by 12.
Set the holiday allowance and hours per day — the hourly figure is built from them.

How much more than salary an employee costs

Each row is a run of this calculator at 30 percent contributions, 5,000 of benefits and 8,000 of workplace cost a month. Only the salary changes.

The multiple falls as the salary rises, and that is not an error: contributions scale with pay while workplace costs do not. A desk, a laptop and licences cost the same for a junior as for a lead, so on a cheaper employee they weigh far more.

Runs of this calculator at 30% contributions, 5,000 of benefits and 8,000 of workplace cost a month.
Salary	Contributions	Total above salary, contributions included	Full monthly cost	Per year	Multiple of salary
60,000	18,000	31,000	91,000	1,092,000	1.52
100,000	30,000	43,000	143,000	1,716,000	1.43
150,000	45,000	58,000	208,000	2,496,000	1.39
250,000	75,000	88,000	338,000	4,056,000	1.35

What this calculator shows

The monthly and annual cost of the employee
The cost of an hour of their working time
How much of it is contributions and how much is everything else

What to keep in mind

The calculator applies the flat rate you enter, thirty percent by default. In Russia in 2026 the general rate is 30% up to the annual contribution base of RUB 2,979,000 per employee and 15.1% above it, and reduced rates exist; the calculator does not apply those rules itself. Other jurisdictions differ.
The hourly figure spreads the annual cost over the working days left after holiday, so paid leave lands on the days actually worked.

FAQs

Why does an employee cost more than the salary?

Contributions, benefits, a workplace, hardware and software all sit on top. How many times the salary that comes to depends on those amounts: 1.43 at the default figures.

Is the tax on the salary counted twice?

No. Income tax comes out of the salary and is already inside the gross figure; contributions are paid by the employer on top of it.

Should recruitment cost be included?

Ideally, spread over the expected tenure. A hire costing two months of salary against a three-year tenure adds a few percent to the monthly figure.

Why does the hourly cost look so high?

Because it is annual cost divided by hours genuinely worked. Holiday, sick leave and public holidays are paid but not worked, and they all land on the remaining hours.

Why is the full cost half again the salary?

Because contributions come on top, along with everything spent around the person: the workplace, the hardware, the licences, the training. At a salary of 100,000 that is 30,000 in contributions and 13,000 of other costs — 43,000 above the salary in all.

How is the hourly cost worked out?

The annual cost divided by the hours actually worked: working days minus holiday, times hours per day. Holiday is paid but not worked, so it raises the price of every hour that is.

Worked example

A hundred thousand a month

Input: 100,000 salary, 30 percent contributions, 5,000 benefits, 8,000 workplace

Output: 143,000 a month, 1.43 times the salary

Note: That is 1.72 million a year and about 979 an hour of real work. The hourly figure is what to use when deciding whether a task is worth doing in-house.

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Result

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