How much do you get paid to be the leader of the free world?
Since 2001, the president of the United States has been paid $400,000 a year. Compare that to 1789, when the US elected its first president, and the presidential salary was $25,000 a year.
While that may sound like a fraction of today’s paycheck, the salary’s value has actually decreased by about half when adjusted for inflation.
In the 237 years since, the president has only received a handful of raises, although, of course, the office comes with plenty of other perks.
Here’s how the president’s annual compensation has changed since America’s founding.
For the first 84 years of the United States’ existence, the president earned $25,000 a year.
When Washington was elected in 1789, the task fell to Congress to decide what the presidential compensation should be.
In 2026 dollars, that $25,000 salary would be equal to approximately $949,000, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ consumer price index.
In all, Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, James K. Polk, Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, Abraham Lincoln, and Andrew Johnson all made $25,000.
The first change came in 1873, when Ulysses S. Grant was the president. The annual salary was raised to $50,000.
By 1873, that $25,000 had depreciated to about $696,000 in today’s money. A sizable bump to $50,000 a year made the salary worth almost $1.4 million in 2026 dollars.
Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Chester A. Arthur, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, and Theodore Roosevelt all made $50,000.
That lasted for 36 years, until 1909, during William Howard Taft’s term. It was raised to $75,000.
The $50,000 salary lasted for about three decades. In 1909, it was raised to $75,000, or about $2.75 million in 2026 dollars.
Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Harry Truman (during his first term) all earned $75,000.
Another 40 years passed before it was raised again in 1949 during Harry S. Truman’s second term, when it reached $100,000.
By 1949, that $75,000 had depreciated in value to about $1 million in 2026 dollars. So Congress voted to raise it to $100,000, or about $1.4 million in today’s currency.
Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson all made $100,000 a year.
In 1969, Congress raised the salary to $200,000.
In 1969, the $100,000 salary was worth around $910,000 in today’s money, whereas the $200,000 salary was worth around $1.8 million.
Lyndon B. Johnson was president at the time, but the raise didn’t go into effect until Richard Nixon took office.
Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Bill Clinton earned $200,000 a year.
Three decades later, in 2001, George W. Bush became the first president to be paid $400,000 annually. It hasn’t been raised since.
In 1999, Congress voted to raise the salary to $400,000 starting in 2001. That amount would be worth around $762,000 today.
There hasn’t been a raise since then: Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump, and Joe Biden have all made $400,000.
Before he took office in 2017, Trump said he would not take home the presidential salary, and during his first term, he donated the payments to federal agencies, including the National Park Service and the Department of Transportation.
Trump said he would forgo his salary during his second term. The White House has not publicly said where the payments have gone.
Other presidents have taken a similar approach — Hoover and Kennedy donated their salaries to charities.
Since 1949, the president has also received a $50,000 expense account.
In 1949, Congress passed an act that raised compensation to $100,000 and established a $50,000 expense account.
The $50,000 covers expenses related to the president’s official duties, such as dry-cleaning and hosting social gatherings. Unused funds revert to the US Treasury.
They’ve also had a $100,000 travel budget and a $19,000 allowance for entertainment expenses.
The $100,000 travel budget has been in effect since 1978 — before that, it was $40,000.
When you leave office, that doesn’t mean the paychecks stop coming.
Since 1958, presidents have received a pension equal to the “salary of a Cabinet-level secretary.” For example, Obama’s presidential pension is $253,100 annually.
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