Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO)

Labour Force Section (AES)

Swiss Federal Statistical Office
Labour Force Section
Espace de l'Europe 10
CH-2010 Neuchâtel

Number of hours worked

The sources are the quarterly job statistics (BESTA/STATEM/STATIMP/JOBSTAT), which provides information on the number of jobs, and the work volume statistics (AVOL/SVOLTA/SVOL/WV), which provides information on the average number of hours worked per job.

The main purpose of the hours worked index is to reflect changes in labour demand at an early stage and to provide early signals of shifts in the business cycle.

NACE rev. 2.0

The index covers Sections B to E  (Industry),  Section F (Construction),  Section G (Trade) and Sections H to N  and P to S (Services) of the NACE Rev. 2.0.

According to the definition of employment valid for the Swiss Business Register, a job is defined as a post occupied by one person in an enterprise for which a contribution is paid to the Swiss social security system (AHV/AVS). This also covers self-employed persons.

The hours worked correspond to the number of hours actually worked in the scope of employment. In contrast to contractual hours of employees, they include overtime but do not include absences.

Job statistics: the enterprise is the reporting unit and the establishment (local unit) is the observation unit.

Work volume statistics: the person is the reporting and observation unit.

Job statistics: all enterprises with at least one job in Industry, Construction, Retail trade and Services.

Work volume statistics: population according to domestic concept. The domestic concept describes the productive activity carried out on Swiss economic territory, regardless of whether it is performed by residents or non-residents.

Switzerland

Data are available from 2010.

Base year 2021 =100

Indices

Quarter

Federal Law on Statistics of 9 October 1992

Bundesstatistikgesetz (BstatG) vom 9. Oktober 1992

Loi fédérale du 9 octobre 1992 sur la statistique fédérale (LSF)

Ordinance of 30 June 1993 on the Implementation of Statistical Surveys

Verordnung vom 30. Juni 1993 über die Durchführung von statistischen Erhebungen des Bundes

Ordonnance du 30 juin 1993 concernant l'exécution des relevés statistiques fédéraux

EBS Regulation: Legislation - Short-term business statistics - Eurostat (europa.eu)

Data are only sent to Eurostat.

The compilation and publication of the data are governed by the Federal Law on Statistics (10/9/92), the Ordinance on the Execution of Statistical Surveys (06/30/93) and the Federal Law on Data Protection (06/19/92). The Federal Law on Data Protection specifies that the Swiss Federal Statistical Office cannot publish, or otherwise make available to any individual or organisation, statistics that would enable the identification of data for any individual person or entity.

The Laws and Ordinance are published in German, French and Italian and copies can be obtained, for a fee, or downloaded for free from BBL, CH-3003 Bern, Switzerland,  Internet: https://www.fedlex.admin.ch/

Data are only published up to the activity level, at which level they are not confidential.

Data are transmitted to Eurostat within 90 days of the end of the reference period.

Not available

Data are published only on the Eurostat website.

Until the data are published, only the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs and the Swiss National Bank had access to the data.

Quarterly

Not available

Not available

Not available

Not available

Data are sent to Eurostat on a quarterly basis.

Document on the concept and methodological introduction (in French) is available upon request.

Not available

Mission Statement for the Federal Statistical Office | Publication | Federal Statistical Office (admin.ch)

Quality commitment | Federal Statistical Office (admin.ch)

Fullfilled according to international regulations.

Users are both in the public sector (Swiss National Bank, State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, universities) and in the private sector (companies, financial markets). 

Not available

Data comply with Eurostat's STS requirements.

Margin of error cannot be estimated because the index is compiled from various sources.

Job statistics: variation coefficient below 0.5% for total employment and below 1% per economic sector

Work volume statistics: variation coefficient below 1% for total employment

Job statistics: sampling error is calculated and published in the document Cadre de sondage STATEM 4ème trim. 2023: annexe méthodologique | Publication | Federal Statistical Office (admin.ch)

Swiss Labour Force Survey (main source of the work volume statistics): sampling error ist published in the document Swiss Labour Force Survey Quality Report 2022 | Publication | Office fédéral de la statistique (admin.ch)

Job statistics: Email, postal and phone reminders are sent to speed up or increase the rate of response. The response rate at the time that the survey closes excedes 90% and 85% for employment and other variables, respectively.

Swiss Labour Force Survey (main source of the work volume statistics): non-sampling error ist published in the document Swiss Labour Force Survey Quality Report 2022 | Publication | Office fédéral de la statistique (admin.ch)

Data are transmitted to Eurostat within 90 days after the end of the reference period.

Delivery dates to Eurostat are respected.

The geographical area covered is Switzerland (broken down by the seven "NUTS2 regions"). 

Data are available from 2010. 

Data was revised in 2020 to ensure the accuracy of absences due to reduced working hours.

Data can be cross-checked to some extent with the results of the work volume statistics (annual data).

Internal consistency is ensured.

Existing data are used (job statistics and work volume statistics) in order to minimize costs and burdens.

Data are revised each time the source (job statistics and work volume statistics) is revised.

The hours worked index is calculated from two sources (job statistics and work volume statistics). When one or both are revised, the index is also revised. 

Job statistics: a survey of 18,000 secondary and tertiary sector enterprises (65,000 businesses) to produce labour market indicators for Switzerland.

Work volume statistics: summary statistics. The Swiss Labour Force Survey is the main source. Survey based on sampling of individuals, whose addresses are selected at random from the FSO’s sample register. This is based on official communal and cantonal population registers. In total, 120,000 are now conducted per year. Persons participating in the survey are interviewed four times over a one and a half-year period (except for people aged 75 and over who are only interviewed once).

Quarterly

Job statistics: a single questionnaire is used for all respondents regardless of size and activity. Four channels of data collection are used: files, internet, paper questionaires and phone calls (reminders and late delivery cases).

Work volume statistics: from 1991 to 2020, the Swiss labour force survey was a telephone survey. Since 2021, it has been a mixed-mode survey (either online or by telephone), online being the preferred means.

Job statistics: individual data are checked among quarters and against the sampling frame.

Work volume statistics: includes a general check, plausibilizations, the construction of different weightings and the construction of different variables.

 For each economic sector, the quarterly actual working time per job (source: work volume statistics) is multiplied by the number of jobs (source: job statistics).

Seasonal adjustment is conducted using X13-ARIMA. Data are adjusted at the level of divisions (NACE 2-digit). The direct method is used for other aggregates.

None