How much do top-flight referees get paid? Starting at the 2018 world cup , fifa have paid each referee a basic pay of $70,000, the equivalent of around £59,000, and revealed this would be done for each tournament going forward. · considering reports indicate that kuipers makes between £2–3 million annually in profit alone, the retired referee can confidently claim to out-earn the typical player in england’s top flight. · like all the other referees who are officiating the 2014 fifa world cup , jonas eriksson was selected from an extremely small group of candidates who passed a series of equally extreme physical and intellectual challenges. Despite the glitz and glamour associated with football, it was his off-pitch endeavours that made him a millionaire overnight. Why did jonas eriksson only pursue a career as a referee? Multi- millionaire business mogul jonas eriksson once made the astonishing admission that he only pursued a career as a referee due to his hatred of them. The 51-year-old was a fifa-listed. The now retired official, 49,was richer than some of the players on the pitch after it was revealed he is a multi- millionaire of supermarket chain. · multi- millionaire business mogul jonas eriksson once made the astonishing admission that he only pursued a career as a referee due to his hatred of them. · by the time he was a fully-fledged allsvenskan referee , eriksson had become a partner and sales director at his firm. · bjorn kuipers was the official referee for england’s world cup game vs sweden at the 2018 world cup, but that was not his only job. The 51-year-old was a fifa-listed official from 2002 to 2018, during which he was seen as one of the elite referees in world football. How much does a referee make in england?