The ECB President is facing backlash after disclosing she earns over €140,000 a year as a board member for the Bank for International Settlements (BIS). ECB policy bans regular staff from accepting third-party payments.
Christine Lagarde disclosed on Friday that she received 130,457 Swiss francs (€142,700) from the Bank for International Settlements last year, according to a letter sent to MEPs Fabio De Masi and Dick Erixon and cited by the Financial Times.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
Internally, ECB workers have called out the apparent dishonesty of Christine Lagarde’s “double salary”.
One employee bluntly posted “Preach water, drink wine!” as per screenshots seen and reported on by the FT.
Staff members said they are prohibited from accepting outside payments for work-related duties.
Even the designated ECB employee who accompanies Lagarde to her BIS meetings is not permitted to receive an allowance from the bank.
As stated in the standards rulebook, if regular employees are offered outside compensation for their duties, that money must be handed over to the ECB.
"We mortals can't take the BIS allowance," wrote another frustrated staffer.
The central bank defended the payments by drawing a hard line between standard employees and executive leadership, arguing that Lagarde is not a general staff member and operates under a separate code of conduct for high-level executives.
The ECB also claims that Lagarde's BIS role requires making major governance decisions that carry personal legal risks, justifying the separate salary, and that staff members assisting her do not carry these same liabilities.
The eurozone central bank also defended Lagarde by pointing out that the ECB President is simply following in the tradition of her predecessors, Mario Draghi and Jean-Claude Trichet, who also received a BIS allowance.
Lagarde is one of 18 top central bankers on the BIS board, but not all of them handle the extra remuneration in the same way.
For instance, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve and the Governor of the Bank of England both do not claim their BIS salary. In the case of the Fed, US law outright prohibits officials from accepting money from foreign institutions.
The Bank of France allows its governor to keep the allowance but reclaims 50% of the fixed BIS pay for the institution.
With her combined income streams, Lagarde is currently the highest-paid official in the European Union, taking home an estimated €743,000 annually.
