Reference metadata describe statistical concepts and methodologies used for the collection and generation of data. They provide information on data quality and, since they are strongly content-oriented, assist users in interpreting the data. Reference metadata, unlike structural metadata, can be decoupled from the data.
The Structure of Earnings Survey (SES) is a 4-yearly survey which provides EU-wide harmonised structural data on gross earnings, hours paid and annual days of paid holiday leave, which are collected every four years under Council Regulation (EC) No 530/1999 concerning structural statistics on earnings and on labour costs, and Commission Regulation (EC) No 1738/2005 amending Regulation (EC) No 1916/2000 as regards the definition and transmission of information on the structure of earnings. The objective of this legislation is so that National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) provide accurate and harmonised data on earnings in EU Member States and other countries for policy-making and research purposes.
The SES 2010 provides detailed and comparable information on relationships between the level of hourly, monthly and annual remuneration, personal characteristics of employees (sex, age, occupation, length of service, highest educational level attained, etc.) and their employer (economic activity, size and economic control of the enterprise).
Regional data is also available for some countries and regional metadata is identical to that provided for national data.
3.2. Classification system
The economic activity is coded using NACE Rev. 1.1 (General industrial classification of economic activities within the European Communities).
The occupation is coded according to the International Standard Classification of Occupations, 1988 - ISCO-88 (COM).
The variable 'Highest successfully completed level of education and training' is classified using the International Standard Classification of Education, 1997 version (ISCED 97).
Regional breakdown is based on the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) reference year 2006. Detailed NUTS classifications are available for EU Member States as well as for EFTA and Candidate Countries
3.3. Coverage - sector
The statistics cover all economic activities defined in sections C to K and M to O of the General industrial classification of economic activities within the European Communities (NACE Rev. 1.1) in enterprises with at least 10 employees. The size of the enterprise in terms of the number of employees corresponds to the following size classes: 1 to 9, 10 to 49, 50 to 249, 250 to 499, 500 to 999, and 1 000 or more employees. The size class 1 to 9 is optional.
3.4. Statistical concepts and definitions
Employees are all persons who have a direct employment contract with the enterprise or local unit and receive remuneration, irrespective of the type of work performed, the number of hours worked (full or part-time) and the duration of the contract (fixed or indefinite).
Mean monthly gross earnings in the reference month cover remuneration in cash paid before any tax deductions and social security contributions payable by wage earners and retained by the employer, and are restricted to gross earnings which are paid in each pay period during the reference month.
Mean annual gross earnings also cover all 'non-standard payments', i.e. payments not occurring in each pay period, such as: 13th or 14th month payments, holiday bonuses, quarterly or annual company bonuses and annual payments in kind.
Mean hourly gross earnings are defined as gross earnings in the reference month divided by the number of hours paid during the same period.
Number of hours paid includes all normal and overtime hours worked and remunerated by the employer during the reference month. Hours not worked but nevertheless paid are counted as 'paid hours' (e.g. for annual leave, public holidays, paid sick leave, paid vocational training, paid special leave, etc.).
3.5. Statistical unit
The compilation of structural statistics on earnings is based on local units and enterprises, as defined in Council Regulation (EEC) No 696/93, and provides information on employees in enterprises with 10 or more employees classified by size and economic activity. Information for employees in enterprises with fewer than 10 employees is optional. The statistics shall cover all activities defined in sections C to K and M to O of the general industrial classification of economic activities within the European Communities (NACE Rev. 1.1) in enterprises with at least 10 employees.
3.6. Statistical population
The SES 2006 statistics refer to enterprises with at least 10 employees in the areas of economic activities defined by NACE Rev. 1.1 sections C to O excluding L. The inclusion of section L is optional for 2006, as well as the inclusion of enterprises with fewrer than 10 employees.
3.7. Reference area
The data cover EU-Member States, Turkey, Iceland and Norway.
3.8. Coverage - Time
2006.
3.9. Base period
Not applicable.
Euro, Purchasing Power Parities, Percentage and absolute number of persons.
The reference year is the calendar year 2006.
The reference month is October for the majority of the countries. The choice of another month is accepted as long as justified as being representative by the country. For further details, refer to the National Quality Reports on CIRCABC library.
6.1. Institutional Mandate - legal acts and other agreements
EU-Member States and other European countries participating in the four-yearly Structure of Earnings Survey according to the
Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 on European statistics (recital 24 and Article 20(4)) of 11 March 2009 (OJ L 87, p. 164), stipulates the need to establish common principles and guidelines ensuring the confidentiality of data used for the production of European statistics and the access to those confidential data with due account for technical developments and the requirements of users in a democratic society.
7.2. Confidentiality - data treatment
In the SES, information about individual entities (employees and enterprises) is collected. The safety of these microdata has to be guaranteed to make sure that individual entities cannot be recognised through inspection of released data. The goal of disclosure control is to disseminate statistical information in such a way that individual information is sufficiently protected against recognition of the subjects to which it refers, while at the same time providing as much information as possible.
Only tabular data have therefore been published. In order to limit the disclosure risk of these tables the following measures have been applied:
Region: restricted to the national level;
Economic activity: restricted to NACE Rev 1.1, one digit level;
Size of the enterprise: published in size classes of employee numbers;
Age: restricted to 5 size classes (less than 30 year, 30-39 years, 40-49 years, 50-59 years, 60+ years);
Occupation published at one digit level of the ISCO 88 (COM) classification.
The anonymisation method for SES 2006 consists of two primary confidentiality rules (a minimum frequency and a dominance rule) and as additional protection, secondary confidentiality rule are applied to protect data from recalculation.
8.1. Release calendar
Not applicable.
8.2. Release calendar access
Not applicable.
8.3. Release policy - user access
In line with the Community legal framework and the European Statistics Code of Practice Eurostat disseminates European statistics on Eurostat's website (see item 10 - 'Accessibility and clarity') respecting professional independence and in an objective, professional and transparent manner in which all users are treated equitably. The detailed arrangements are governed by the Eurostat protocol on impartial access to Eurostat data for users.
Please consult free data on-line or refer to contact details.
10.4. Dissemination format - microdata access
The conditions for SES microdata access are stated in the Regulation (EC) No 1104/2006 of 18 July 2006 amending Regulation (EC) No 831/2002 implementing Council Regulation (EC) No 322/97 on Community Statistics, concerning access to confidential data for scientific purposes. For details see Access to microdata.
10.5. Dissemination format - other
Not applicable.
10.6. Documentation on methodology
SES 2006 implementing arragements (see 21.3 below).
10.7. Quality management - documentation
SES 2006 national quality reports and synthesis of quality reports (see 21.3 below).
11.1. Quality assurance
According to Regulation (EC) 530/1999 national authorities shall ensure that the results reflect the true situation of the total population of units with a sufficient degree of representativity. National authorities are therefore obliged by Regulation (EC) No 698/2006 to provide a Quality Report containing all relevant information to enable the quality of the statistics to be evaluated. The transmission deadline for the SES 2006 Quality Report is 31 December 2008.
The main users of SES microdata are; the European Commission, European Parliament, ECB, OECD, IMF, ILO, etc. at international level, as well as Ministries for Economy or Finance, trade unions, employers' associations, political parties, research centres, universities and the media at national level.
Comparability of the SES data across national borders may be affected by the use of different observation units and definitions, methods or classification schemes, i. e. by deviations between national and Community concepts
They are normally not revised except in exceptional cases where a country has detected an error and submitted the correction to Eurostat. All thus reported errors (once validated) result in corrections of the disseminated data as soon as the correct data have been validated.
18.1. Source data
The data collection of data for the SES 2006 can be obtained from 'tailor-made' questionnaires, existing surveys, administrative data or a combination of such sources, which provide the equivalent information. While accepting a degree of flexibility in the means employed for collecting the survey data, the information obtained must be of acceptable quality and be comparable between European countries.
18.2. Frequency of data collection
Four-yearly.
18.3. Data collection
The national surveys were generally conducted on the basis of a two-stage random sampling approach of enterprises or local units (first stage) and employees (second stage).
18.4. Data validation
Data validation consists of global checks and plausibility checks. Global checks are necessary to ensure that complete data is received for microdata records. For each country, all microdata records should contain data for all mandatory variables. Missing data or codes are not accepted. Concerning optional variables each country decides which of these it is able to supply. Furthermore, plausibility checks on all variables were done to ensure that the data are reasonable and consistent with other SES variables. Possible deviations are reported by countries in their national Quality Report transmitted to Eurostat.
18.5. Data compilation
EU aggregated are computed, with the number of employees per country being the weighting factor.
18.6. Adjustment
Not applicable.
Items 12 to 20 refer to the national SES 2006 Quality Reports (see Annex 21.3).
The Structure of Earnings Survey (SES) is a 4-yearly survey which provides EU-wide harmonised structural data on gross earnings, hours paid and annual days of paid holiday leave, which are collected every four years under Council Regulation (EC) No 530/1999 concerning structural statistics on earnings and on labour costs, and Commission Regulation (EC) No 1738/2005 amending Regulation (EC) No 1916/2000 as regards the definition and transmission of information on the structure of earnings. The objective of this legislation is so that National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) provide accurate and harmonised data on earnings in EU Member States and other countries for policy-making and research purposes.
The SES 2010 provides detailed and comparable information on relationships between the level of hourly, monthly and annual remuneration, personal characteristics of employees (sex, age, occupation, length of service, highest educational level attained, etc.) and their employer (economic activity, size and economic control of the enterprise).
Regional data is also available for some countries and regional metadata is identical to that provided for national data.
6 June 2014
Employees are all persons who have a direct employment contract with the enterprise or local unit and receive remuneration, irrespective of the type of work performed, the number of hours worked (full or part-time) and the duration of the contract (fixed or indefinite).
Mean monthly gross earnings in the reference month cover remuneration in cash paid before any tax deductions and social security contributions payable by wage earners and retained by the employer, and are restricted to gross earnings which are paid in each pay period during the reference month.
Mean annual gross earnings also cover all 'non-standard payments', i.e. payments not occurring in each pay period, such as: 13th or 14th month payments, holiday bonuses, quarterly or annual company bonuses and annual payments in kind.
Mean hourly gross earnings are defined as gross earnings in the reference month divided by the number of hours paid during the same period.
Number of hours paid includes all normal and overtime hours worked and remunerated by the employer during the reference month. Hours not worked but nevertheless paid are counted as 'paid hours' (e.g. for annual leave, public holidays, paid sick leave, paid vocational training, paid special leave, etc.).
The compilation of structural statistics on earnings is based on local units and enterprises, as defined in Council Regulation (EEC) No 696/93, and provides information on employees in enterprises with 10 or more employees classified by size and economic activity. Information for employees in enterprises with fewer than 10 employees is optional. The statistics shall cover all activities defined in sections C to K and M to O of the general industrial classification of economic activities within the European Communities (NACE Rev. 1.1) in enterprises with at least 10 employees.
The SES 2006 statistics refer to enterprises with at least 10 employees in the areas of economic activities defined by NACE Rev. 1.1 sections C to O excluding L. The inclusion of section L is optional for 2006, as well as the inclusion of enterprises with fewrer than 10 employees.
The data cover EU-Member States, Turkey, Iceland and Norway.
The reference year is the calendar year 2006.
The reference month is October for the majority of the countries. The choice of another month is accepted as long as justified as being representative by the country. For further details, refer to the National Quality Reports on CIRCABC library.
Euro, Purchasing Power Parities, Percentage and absolute number of persons.
EU aggregated are computed, with the number of employees per country being the weighting factor.
The data collection of data for the SES 2006 can be obtained from 'tailor-made' questionnaires, existing surveys, administrative data or a combination of such sources, which provide the equivalent information. While accepting a degree of flexibility in the means employed for collecting the survey data, the information obtained must be of acceptable quality and be comparable between European countries.
Comparability of the SES data across national borders may be affected by the use of different observation units and definitions, methods or classification schemes, i. e. by deviations between national and Community concepts
