Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union

F3: Labour market

2920 Luxembourg LUXEMBOURG

This data collection has been discontinued in 2012. Data is only available up to reference year 2011.

Annual data on average gross earnings and related employment are included in the Gross earnings - Annual data collection.

Data are available for EU Member States, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. Data are also broken down by:

From reference year 2008 onwards average gross annual earnings per employee are provided

• by economic activity (NACE Rev.2 aggregates and sections B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, B_TO_E, B_TO_F, B_TO_N, B_TO_S_NOT_O, B_TO_S, G_TO_J, G_TO_N, G_TO_S_NOT_O, K_TO_N, P_TO_S and O_TO_S)
• for enterprises with 1+ and for enterprises with 10+ employees for the following breakdowns:
• FTU= full-time units, FT=full-time workers, PT=part-time workers by Total, Men and Women.

Before 2008: data is broken down by economic activity (NACE Rev. 1.1 for Sections C to K and the C-E, C-F, G-I, J-K, G-K, C-K and for some Member States L, M-O, L-O and also C-O aggregates)

• FTU= full-time units, FT=full-time workers, PT=part-time workers
• gender
• occupation (ISCO-88 classification, one-digit level and the 1-5 and 7-9 aggregates)
• The data relate to the staff of enterprises having at least 10 employees in most countries.

Countries provide these annual data using several statistical sources mainly the four-yearly SES, the EU Labour Force Survey and/or administrative data.

The following breakdowns are provided:

a) by geographical classification (see: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/gisco_Geographical_information_maps/introduction)                                                           

b) by economic activity (Statistical Classification of Economic Activities in the European Union - NACE)

c) by gender

d) by full-time / part-time employment / full-time equivalent units

e) Before 2008: by occupation (International Standard Classification of Occupations, 1988 version (ISCO-88) at one-digit level and the 1-5 and 7-9 aggregates). see: http://www.ilo.org/public/english/bureau/stat/isco/ for further details.

Data disseminated refers to the economic activity classification NACE Rev. 2 from reference year 2008 onwards. Where available, the time series includes back casts in NACE Rev. 2.

For periods up to reference year 2008, data were compiled using the previous classification NACE Rev. 1.1 and are disseminated in separate tables.

Series up to 2008 are broken down by NACE Rev. 1.1 at section level for sections C to O and the C-E, C-F, C-K, C-O, C-O (excl. L), G-I, G-K, J-K, M-O aggregates.

The main differences between NACE Rev. 1.1 and NACE Rev. 2 are to be found in the more detailed breakdown of the services sectors, on the one hand, and the less detailed breakdown of the manufacturing sector, on the other hand. For more information on NACE: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/nace_rev2/introduction 

NACE Rev. 2 sections B to S (NACE Rev. 1.1 sections C to O).

The earnings data should relate to all enterprises, i.e. enterprises with 1 or more employees and enterprises with 10 and more employees.

If it is only possible to provide data on other bases (e.g. excluding irregular payments, or covering different enterprise sizes than the ones mentioned above) a description of the coverage of earnings and enterprises should be provided by the countries.

The basis for the calculation of average gross annual earnings is those of employees that have been employed for a full year. The employees that have not worked for a full year because they joined or left the company during the year should be excluded, unless the country has a good basis for making upward adjustments to their earnings.

Information is provided on average annual gross earnings and related employment.

Gross earnings cover remuneration in cash and in kind before any tax deductions and social security contributions payable by wage earners and retained by the employer. Average annual gross earnings shall include all bonuses and other payments not regularly paid in each pay period (severance paiments and termination pay are excluded). Earnings data are expressed in euro, national currencies and Purchasing Power Standard (PPS). The latter takes into account the price level differences across countries. Information on employment is expressed as head counts and in Full-Time Units.

The statistical unit is the enterprise or local unit.

The population consists of all units having 1+ employees, although it is at present still confined to enterprises with at least 10 employees in most countries.

Data are available for EU Member States, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland.

The time coverage is annual from 1995 up to 2011. This data collection has been discontinued in 2012.

Not applicable

Earnings data are expressed in euro, national currencies and Purchasing Power Standard (PPS). Information on employment is expressed as head counts and in Full-Time Units.

Calendar year.

The collection of annual gross earnings data are based on a Gentlemen's agreement.

Not applicable.

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.

Countries inform Eurostat if any confidential data shall be disclosed by flagging the respective data cells. This is done on the basis of Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 on European statistics (recital 24 and Article 20(4)) of 11 March 2009 (OJ L 87, p. 164), which 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.

No release calendar.

Not applicable

Not applicable.

Yearly.

Not applicable.

http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat

http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/product?code=KS-32-11-798&mode=view&language=en

Please consult free data on-line or refer to contact details

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Refer to Annex

Refer to Annex

On arrival at Eurostat, gross earning data from countries are checked for completeness and consistency.

Not applicable

Not available.

Not available.

Not all countries provide data for all variables and/or for all NACE sections and aggregates.

Eurostat carries out specific coherence and plausibility checks. The aim of these checks is to detect inaccurate, inconsistent or implausible data. Outliers in time series or inconsistencies with other data sources are analysed. If a potential problem is detected, the country involved has to check and to change or confirm the figures; in the latter case, a further explanation on the underlying economic development is often delivered.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Countries are asked to transmit their reference year (t) data in Autumn of year t+1. The data are immediately made available for general distribution, subject to favourable checks.

Not applicable.

Comparability of data across national borders may be affected by the use of different observation units and definitions, methods or classification schemes.

Comparability over time may be affected by new definitions and classifications used.

Structural Business Statistics (SBS, annual data) and the Labour Force Survey (quarterly data) are surveys that partly measure similar or identical variables, such as "number of employees" or "wages and salaries". Whilst the National Accounts (NA) and the Labour Cost Survey (LCS) are closely related, certain coherence problems should be taken into account when comparing data relating to the same variables from the four different sources (LCS, SBS, Structure of Earnings Survey (SES), NA).

See: 14.1 Overall accuracy.

Not available.

Since this data collection has been discontinued in 2012, no further revisions are forseen.

Not applicable.

Annual Earnings data are obtained using several statistical sources, mainly the four-yearly SES, the EU Labour Force Survey and/or administrative data.

Yearly.

The data are either collected or estimated by the National Statistical Institutes on the basis of surveys and administrative registers.

Eurostat sends a formal data collection request (including a data template) via email, highlighting what and by when data and metadata should be sent.

Countries provide data and metadata to Eurostat via EDAMIS.

In the case of "Net Earnings" data is collected and validated by OECD and sent to Eurostat for dissemination on its website.

Data transmitted by individual countries are checked for internal consistency and coherence with earlier data. No further adjustments are made (Validation level 2).

Not applicable.

See 20.4.

This data collection has been discontinued in 2012. Data is only available up to reference year 2011.

For further country specific characteristics see the annexes by reference year.