This chapter takes a sociological approach to the Mauritanian population’s perception of wages. The research is based on field surveys, discussion groups, and the use of available academic and institutional literature (ILO, World Bank, etc.). In 1960, there were perhaps 3000 workers, compared with 300,000 today, with considerable statistical uncertainty and variability in the data (seasonal activity, drought, etc.). During colonization, salaries were very attractive to the very poor population, nomadic herders, and sedentary farmers. In the 1950s, the colonial labour code allowed for a gradual transition in the status of workers. In the 1960s and 1970s, Mauritanians viewed salaries positively because of their regularity, stability, and associated benefits, and the years of drought from 1969 to 1973 accelerated the rural exodus. However, the weakness and slow progression of civil servants’ salaries and the strong competition from the population in an urbanized and industrialized labour market undermined the attractiveness of salaries in the 1970s and 1980s. Considered a stable anchor for the most modest rural or nomadic populations, a guarantor of social progress for the middle classes, wage employment is now seen by the upper classes as a “poor relative” situation.