Archive:Employment - quarterly statistics

Data extracted in October 2020

Planned article update: January 2020

Highlights

The EU employment rate went down from 73.1 % in the last quarter of 2019 to 72.0 % in the second quarter of 2020.

Employment rates of young people decreased by 2.1 p.p. (from 33.3% to 31.2%) between the last quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of 2020.

Between the last quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of 2020, employment rates decreased by 3.8 p.p. in Estonia and increased by 0.8 p.p. in Malta.

Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

The recent health crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted employment in the European Union. In order to keep the expected negative consequences of the COVID-19 crisis on employment and businesses at bay, measures (such as short-time work and financial support to enterprises) were implemented in some EU Member States in the course of March or April 2020. In the first weeks of the crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this kept employed people relatively secure in their jobs thus, avoiding mass lay-oﬀs. However, this first stage was already marked by reduced inﬂows into employment. Enterprises might have slowed down, revised or cancelled their hiring process or might have decided to not renewing fixed-term contracts or probationary periods for example. These specific effects affecting directly young people were clearly visible during the second quarter of 2020 as further explained in this article in addition to the first signs of the global deterioration of the labour market in many countries.

This article focuses then on the changes in employment observed during the crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic based on the quarterly data from the Labour Force Survey. It shows the recent and long term developments as regards employment, mostly on a global European level but also specifically according to gender, age and level of education attainment. A specific analysis dedicated to the evolution of temporary contracts and part-time work, including underemployed part-time workers, is also presented in this article.

Another article complements this article with a detailed analysis on the evolution of the employed population by occupation, activity sector, age, level of education and professional status, by EU Member State. Both articles are part of the publication Labour market in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. The current version of these articles focuses on the evolution of employment from the last quarter 2019 to the second quarter of 2020 i.e. April-June 2020. In January, they will be reviewed in order to include data on the third quarter of 2020.

_{Note: This article mainly uses seasonal adjusted data. Please take note that figures presented in this article may differ in some cases from the source data, due to continuous revision of the Eurostat database (Employment and unemployment (Labour Force Survey)).}

Full article

Employment in the EU-27 sharply impacted

The employment rate decreased by 1 p.p. from the first to the second quarter 2020, the strongest decline ever recorded since 2000

Since 2013, the share of employed people in the total EU population kept on growing from one quarter to the next until the third quarter of 2019, when it lost 0.1 p.p. compared with the previous quarter for the first time in six years. The employment rate decreased consecutively to the same extent i.e. 0.1 p.p. in the two next quarters (from the third to the fourth quarter of 2019 and from the fourth quarter of 2019 to the first quarter of 2020). However, from the first quarter of 2020 (2020Q1) to the second quarter of 2020 (2020Q2), the share of people in employment went down from 73.0 % to 72.0 % (- 1 p.p.), recording the sharpest cut since 2000 (see Figure 1). Before the second quarter of 2020, the deepest decline from one quarter to another was observed in the third quarter of 2009 when the decrease reached 0.5 p.p.

Moreover, the employment of men and women decreased to different extent between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2. In the last quarter of 2019, 79.0 % of the total male population and 67.3 % of the total female population aged between 20-64 were employed, this share went down to 77.7 % in the second quarter of 2020 for men (- 1.3 p.p.) and to 66.3 % for women (-1.0 p.p.).

The labour force (also shortened to active population), which includes both employed and unemployed people, decreased exactly in the same proportion as the employment rate i.e. -1.1 p.p. between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2 accounting for 77.0 % of the total population in 2020Q2.

Figure 1: Evolution of employed people and active population, 20-64, 2000Q1-2020Q2
(in % of the total population)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

In the second quarter of 2020, 72.0 % of people aged 20-64 were employed in the EU. In terms of comparison, in the first quarter of 2000 which is the starting point of the time series, less than two thirds of the total population between 20-64 was in employment (65.2 %). The increase over these last 20 years is mainly explained by the substantial and steady growth of employment of senior people until the fourth quarter of 2019, increasing from 34.7 % in 2000Q1 to 59.6 % in 2019Q4 and remaining stable to 2020Q1, as can be observed in Figure 2. However, the employment rate of senior also decreased in 2020Q2 compared to 2019Q4 as further explained in this article.

Figure 2: Evolution of employed people and active population, by age groups, EU-27, 2000Q1-2020Q2
(in % of the total population)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

General decline in the employment rates among the vast majority of EU Member States

Among the EU Member States in the second quarter of 2020, there were two countries in which the share of employed people was above 80 % of the population aged 20-64, namely Sweden and Germany, against five countries in the last quarter of 2019. In Sweden, the employment rate was at 80.6 % and at 80.3 % in Germany in the second quarter of 2020. The lowest employment rates were reported in Greece, Italy and Spain, where fewer than two out of three persons were employed at the same period (60.2 % in Greece, 61.9 % in Italy, 64.7 % in Spain).

In the last quarter of 2019, there were five EU Member States instead of two . Actually, 25 out of the 27 Member States registered a lower level of employment in the total population. Between the two quarters, the employment rates fluctuated to different extent among the EU Member States, from -3.8 p.p. in Estonia to +0.8 p.p. in Malta. In Estonia, the employment rates went down from 81.2 % to 77.4 % while decreases greater than 2 p.p. were also registered in Spain (-3.0 p.p.), Portugal and Bulgaria (both, -2.5 p.p.), Austria and Ireland (-2.2 p.p.).

Figure 3: Employment rates by sex and country, people aged 20-64, 2020Q2
(in % of the total population)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Figure 4: Change in the employment rates by sex and country, people aged 20-64, 2019Q4 - 2020Q2
(in percentage points)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Differences in the evolution of the employment rates of men and women are more or less pronounced and not systematically in favour of men or women among countries as displayed in Figure 4. Slightly less than half EU Member States i.e. 12 out of 27 recorded a gap equals to or higher than 1p.p. between the evolutions of their male and female employment rates. For example, in Luxembourg, the employment rate decreased by 2.8 p.p. for men but increased by 0.2 p.p. for women showing the highest difference between men and women among the EU Member States (3.0 p.p. difference). Also in Portugal, although to a lesser degree, the male employment rate dropped by 3.3 p.p. while it decreased by 1.8 p.p. for women (1.5 p.p. difference). In the same way, in Romania, Malta, Germany, Austria and Ireland, the decrease in the male employment rate exceeded by 1 p.p. or more the decrease registered for women. By contrast, the decrease of the female employment rate exceeded by 1.0 p.p. or more the decrease recorded for men in Croatia (by 2.1 p.p.), in Slovenia (by 1.8 p.p.), in Estonia (by 1.2 p.p.), in Hungary (by 1.1 p.p.) and in Cyprus (by 1.0 p.p.).

Young people: worst impacted

In the European Union, employed young people aged 15-24 accounted for 14.4 million people which corresponds to 7.6 % of the total employed people in the second quarter of 2020. This proportion was 7.9 %, two quarters earlier in 2019Q4. Since the first quarter of 2015 until the second quarter of 2019, employment of young people (aged 15-24) increased continuously from one quarter to the next reaching 33.7 %. In the third quarter of 2019, it then decreased by 0.1 p.p. and by 0.3 p.p. in 2019Q4. From the last quarter of 2019 to the first quarter of 2020, the employment rate of young people dropped by 0.5 p.p. and reached 32.8 p.p. A consecutive and stronger decrease followed as the employment rates of young people fell to 31.2 %, registered a cut of 1.6 p.p. which is by far the most substantial variation recorded from a quarter to another for young people since 2000. The second most substantial decrease was 0.7 p.p. recorded in the second quarter of 2009. The decrease between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2 is quite similar for young men and young women. While the employment rate shrank for young men by 2.2 p.p. between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2, reaching 33.5 % in 2020Q2, it also decreased by 2.1 p.p. for young women, reaching 28.8 % in 2020Q2 (see Figure 5).

Figure 5: Employment rates by age group and sex, EU-27, 2000Q1-2020Q2
(in % of the total population)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Moreover, in the EU, almost three in four employed people (73.8 %) were aged between 25 and 54 in the second quarter of 2020 as well as in the last quarter of 2019. This age category stood for 140.6 million people in 2020Q2. Among people in this middle age group, 79.4 % were employed in 2020Q2 against 80.6 % in 2019Q4 and 80.5 % in 2020Q1. For men aged 25-54, the rate went down between the last quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of 2020 from 86.3 % to 85.1 % while for women it dropped from 74.9 % to 73.5 % on the same period.

Regarding people aged 55-64, they stood in 2020Q2 for 35.4 million people which means 18.6 % of the total employed people. Actually, this proportion rose compared to the last quarter of 2019 when they accounted for 18.3 % of the total employed population. Over the 10 years between 2009Q3 and 2019Q2, the sustained growth of the share of employed people aged 55-64 from one quarter to the next was clearly visible at EU level. This increase in the share of workers aged 55-64 is partially explained by the job retention for this sub-population, effective retirement age having risen in many countries in the last two decades. However, in 2019, the employment rate for people aged 55-64 did not grow between the second and the third quarter, despite it having been common to record growth from 0.3 to 0.5 p.p. from one quarter to the next in many previous years. From 2019Q3 to 2019Q4 the share of employed people aged 55-64 increased by 0.3 p.p., reaching 59.6 % in 2019Q4. The same employment level of people aged 55-64 has been maintained to the next quarter i.e. 2020Q1. And for the first time since 2009Q3, the proportion of employed people in the population aged 55-64 decreased in 2020Q2, precisely by 0.4 p.p. reaching 59.2 % in this quarter. Men registered an decrease of 0.5 p.p. between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2, resulting in exactly 65.9 % of the male population aged 55-64 being employed in 2020Q2, while women recorded a slighter decrease of 0.2 p.p., leading to one in two women aged 55-64 in employment in the same quarter (52.9 %). This age category might have less affected by the halt in recruiting during the lock-down than young people in the very short-term, but may be more fragile against mass dismissals in the medium and long term.

Disparate employment rates for men and women with low, medium and high education attainment level

The employment evolution by sex and education attainment level over the period 2005Q1-2020Q2 shows noticeable differences, both for men and women aged 20-64, according to their level of education attainment (see Figure 6). Firstly, the employment rate of men with a high educational level (i.e. tertiary education) is always higher than the employment rate of men with a medium (i.e. upper secondary and post-secondary non-tertiary education) or low educational level (i.e. less than primary, primary and lower secondary education). This was also the case for women. In the same way, people with a medium educational level are proportionately more employed than people with a low educational level. Finally, the lower the education attainment level, the wider the gap between the employment rates of men and women.

As regards people with a high educational level, they accounted for 37.5 % of the total employment in 2020Q2. Men and women follow roughly the same developments over time, but maintain a permanent gap between their respective employment rate. Nevertheless, the gender employment gap for those with a high educational level slightly narrowed over time: from 7.9 p.p. in 2005Q1 to 6.1 p.p. in 2020Q2. In the second quarter of 2020, 86.9 % of men and 80.8 % of women with a high educational level were employed.

Focusing on men and women with a medium level of education attainment, they stood in 2020Q2 for almost half total employment (47.2 %). Their employment rate also followed the same trend over the period 2005Q1-2020Q2, although the fluctuations can be slightly more or less pronounced for men or women. The employment rate of women with a medium educational level was never equal to that of men. A gender employment gap was present over the whole period 2005Q1-2020Q2. It corresponded to 13.3 p.p. in 2005Q1, the record "low" was 11.4 p.p. in 2014Q1 and in 2015Q2 and finally, the employment gap between men and women reached 12.5 p.p. in 2020Q1. In the second quarter of 2020, almost eight out of ten men with a medium educational level (77.4 %) were employed against fewer than two thirds of women (64.9 %).

Finally, at the EU level, less than one in six employed people had a low educational level (15.3 %) in 2020Q2. The employment rate of men with a low educational level corresponded to 64.7 % in 2020Q2; this is slightly less than two out of three men with a low level of education attainment who were employed in the second quarter of 2020. For women, the employment rate was 43.0 % in that quarter, meaning that less than half of the women with a low education attainment level were employed. The gap between men and women was 26.1 p.p. in 2005Q1, went down to 18.5p.p. in 2013Q3, and returned to rise to 22.0 p.p. in 2020Q1 and reached 21.7 % in 2020Q2. As with people with a medium educational level, the gap narrowed when the total employment was reducing and the gap widened when the total employment was on the upswing.

Figure 6: Employment rates by sex and educational attainment level, people aged 20-64, EU-27, 2005Q1-2020Q2
(in % of the total population)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_educ_q)

Sharp decrease in temporary contracts in the vast majority of EU Member States

Losses in employment mainly due to the fall in temporary contracts

Slightly more than one out of 10 employed persons in the EU-27 were employed under temporary contracts 10.2 % in 2020Q2 against 11.5 % in 2019Q4. From 2014Q1 to 2017Q2, temporary contracts had a slight positive trend, reaching 23.4 million people and accounting for 12.5 % of the total employment from 2017Q2 to 2017Q4. Since then, the proportion of temporary contracts in the total employment showed a slight downward trend and went down to 11.3 % in 2020Q1. From 2020Q1 to 2020Q2, this proportion decreased sharply by 1.1 p.p., temporary contracts accounting for 10.2 % of the total employment in 2020Q2 corresponding to 19.2 million persons (see Figure 7). In the European Union, the number of employed people dropped by 3.8 million from the last quarter of 2019 to the second quarter of 2020. Specifically, the number of employed people with temporary contracts shrank by 3.0 million, falling from 22.2 to 19.2 million. The fall in temporary contracts represents 80.5 % of the total decrease in employment. This also contributed to emphasize the decline in youth employment. Indeed, in the last quarter of 2019 as well as in the second quarter of 2020, young people aged 15-24 accounted for 29.0% of the total temporary contracts but for 7.6% of the total employment. Reciprocally, 46.2 % in the last quarter of 2019 and 42.7% in the second quarter 2020 of employed young people had temporary contracts. This phenomena in addition to the expected decrease in hiring might have strongly impacted the youth employment.

Figure 7: Evolution of part-time employment and temporary contracts Vs total employment, people aged 20-64, EU-27, 2008Q1 - 2020Q2
(in thousand persons)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_pt_q)

Among the EU Member States, except Germany for which data is not available, the highest proportions were reported by Spain (18.6 %), Poland (14.6 %) and Portugal (14.3 %) registered the highest shares of temporary contracts in 2020Q2, each exceeding 14% of the total employment. Between the last quarter of 2019 and the second quarter of 2020, 24 out of 26 EU countries registered a decrease in the share of temporary contracts in the total employment. At European level, it decreased by 1.4 p.p. Only in Denmark, the proportion of temporary contracts lowly grew from 8.5 % to 8.7 % (+0.2 p.p.). In Lithuania, the proportion remained stable at 0.9 %. Among the countries recording a decrease, the sharpest cuts were reported by Spain (-3.1 p.p.), Portugal (-2.9 p.p.), Slovenia (-2.6 p.p.), Croatia (-2.3 p.p.) and Malta (2.1 p.p.).

Figure 8: Temporary contracts by country, 2019Q4 and 2020Q2
(in % of total employment)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_pt_q)

Part-time employment at the same level in the last four quarters

In the EU-27, 31.0 million people reported part-time employment in the second quarter of 2020, corresponding to 16.5 % of the total employment (see Figure 7). From 2008Q1 to 2015Q1, the overall upward trend of part-time employment is relatively smooth and continued: it accounted for 29.5 million people, corresponding to 15.9 % of the total employment in the first quarter of 2008, and reached 33.2 million, corresponding to 18.3 % of the total employment in the first quarter of 2015. From 2015Q2 onward, the proportion of part-time workers slightly decreased even if the number of workers might have increased.

Based on 26 EU member States for which data is available, the proportion of part-time workers in the total employment grew in 10 countries, was stable in one and dropped in 16 countries between 2019Q4 and 2020Q2. The sharpest decreased were observed in Ireland (-2.4 p.p.), Malta (-1.7 p.p.), Spain (-1.4 p.p.) and Finland (-1.1 p.p.). By contrast, the proportion of part-time workers in the total employment registered an increase higher than 1 p.p. in Hungary (+1.2 p.p.), in the Netherlands (0.8 p.p.) and in Luxembourg (+0.7 p.p.).

Another relevant aspect related to part-time employment is the underemployed part-time workers; these are persons working part-time, wishing to work additional hours and are available to do so. At EU level, underemployed part-time workers accounted for 3.1 % of the total employment in 2019Q4 and for 3.2 % in 2020Q1. Nevertheless, at country level, the share of underemployed part-time workers decreased by 0.5 p.p. or more in Malta, Spain and Belgium, reaching 0.8 %, 5.3 % and 3.0 % of the total employment respectively. By contrast, rises higher than 0.5 p.p. in the proportion of underemployed part-time workers in the total employment were observed in Italy (+1.5 p.p.) and the Netherlands (+0.7 p.p.), reaching 4.4 % and 4.2 % respectively.

Figure 9: Part-time employment and underemployed part-time workers by country, 2019Q4 and 2020Q2
(in % of total employment)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_pt_q) and (lfsi_sup_q)

Source data for tables and graphs

Employment (general) 2020Q1: tables and figures

Data sources

All figures in this article are based on seasonally adjusted quarterly results from European labour force survey (EU-LFS).

Source: The European Union labour force survey (EU-LFS) is the largest European household sample survey providing quarterly and annual results on labour participation of people aged 15 and over as well as on persons outside the labour force. It covers residents in private households. Conscripts in military or community service are not included in the results. The EU-LFS is based on the same target populations and uses the same definitions in all countries, which means that the results are comparable between countries.

European aggregates: EU refers to the sum of EU-27 Member States. If data are unavailable for a country, the calculation of the corresponding aggregates takes into account the data for the same country for the most recent period available. Such cases are indicated.

Definitions: The concepts and definitions used in the labour force survey follow the guidelines of the International Labour Organisation.

Five different articles on detailed technical and methodological information are linked from the overview page of the online publication EU labour force survey.

Context

The COVID-19 virus hit Europe in January and February 2020, with the first cases confirmed in Spain, France and Italy. COVID-19 infections have now been diagnosed in all European Union (EU) Member States.

To fight the pandemic, EU Member States have taken a wide variety of measures.

From the second week of March, most countries closed retail shops apart from supermarkets, pharmacies and banks. Bars, restaurants and hotels have also been closed. In Italy and Spain, non-essential production was stopped and several countries imposed regional or even national lock-down measures which further stifled the economic activities in many areas.

In addition, schools were closed, public events were cancelled and private gatherings (with numbers of persons varying from 2 to 50) were banned in most Member States.

The large majority of the prevention measures were taken during mid-March 2020 and most of the prevention measures and restrictions were kept for the whole of April and May 2020.

The second quarter of 2020 is consequently the quarter in which the labour market across the EU has been strongly affected by COVID-19 measures taken by the Member States.

Employment and unemployment as defined by the ILO concept are, in this particular situation, not sufficient to describe the developments taking place in the labour market. In this first phase of the crisis, active measures to contain employment losses led to absences from work rather than dismissals, and individuals could not search for work or were not available due to the containment measures, thus not counting as unemployed.

The quarterly data on employment will allow along the quarters to report on the impact of the crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic on employment. This specific article focuses on the age and the level of education attainment of employed people in order to determine potential categories more or less affected by the economic downturn. It will also emphasize the evolution of part-time employment and temporary contracts. A supplementing article to this current article on the evolution of employment by activity and professional status is also available in the context of the publication