Wolff Urges FIA to Lift Junior Staff Salary Cap, Says ‘We Need To Pay Them Better’

The Formula 1 cost cap did what it was supposed to do: it brought the grid closer together and stopped the massive factory teams from simply outspending rivals. But while the on-track product is undeniably tighter, the financial squeeze behind the scenes is starting to take a human toll.

During the Free Practice 3 broadcast at the 2026 Brazilian Grand Prix, Sky Sports F1 pundit Naomi Schiff brought up an interesting point raised by Williams boss James Vowles. Vowles suggested the cost cap is forcing teams to run parts uncomfortably close to their absolute mileage limits, which perfectly explains why the grid is currently dealing with an engine penalties wave, with Max Verstappen, George Russell, and both Ferraris taking grid drops at Interlagos.

Toto Wolff did not just agree; he peeled back the curtain on how brutal the financial reality has become at Brackley.

Toto Wolff, Mercedes

Photo by: Anni Graf – Formula 1 via Getty Images

“Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we know why the cost cap happened,” Wolff explained to the Sky Sports crew. “But we are so on the edge of things that would be better to have more, you know. In our case, we’re not able to carry all chassis over to next year. Some need to be chopped up.”

“Which is quite sad when you look at the record of these cars,” Wolff added. “So every team is under pressure. It’s the same.”

Wolff: “Not for more front wing”

While cutting up carbon fibre is painful, Wolff’s biggest criticism of the cost cap is how it directly suppresses the pay of the people actually building the cars.

F1 relies heavily on gifted young engineering graduates who put in massive hours for the team. Under the current budget regulations, factory wages are being restricted. Wolff revealed that Mercedes had lobbied the FIA about this exact issue.

“I would have loved to have a little bit of an uplift,” Wolff stated. “I think that we, especially the idea that we had was for more junior personnel that joined the team, that we would have more allowance to pay them better. And not being the salaries suppressed in the first five, six, seven years.”

Toto Wolff, Mercedes

Photo by: Simon Galloway / LAT Images via Getty Images

The Mercedes boss wanted to make it clear to the governing body that this was not a sneaky attempt to find a loophole for more aerodynamic development. He said he simply wanted to pay junior staff a fair market rate for the extraordinary hours they put into the championship.

“So we’ve pitched that to the FIA to give us an allowance, not for more front wing, but an allowance for salaries to come up a little bit,” he said. “Because the cost cap suppresses all of that.”

The FIA’s response

Unsurprisingly, asking the FIA to open up the financial rulebook did not go over well. Wolff admitted the pitch was essentially dead on arrival.

“But obviously, that didn’t score a lot of brownie points,” Wolff concluded with a dose of dry reality.

For now, the young engineers at Brackley – and across the rest of the grid – will have to keep grinding under the current financial ceiling, while team bosses continue to stretch every single car component to its breaking point.

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