Archive:Employment - quarterly statistics

Data extracted in March 2022

Planned article update: July 2022

Highlights

In the third quarter of 2021, two thirds of the EU Member States (18 out of 27) had their employment rate higher or equal to their pre-pandemic level of Q4 2019.

Among EU Member States, the largest increases in employment rate from Q4 2019 to Q3 2021 were reported by Poland (+3 p.p.) and Slovenia (+2 p.p.).

In the EU, in the third quarter of 2021, almost half of the employed people aged 15-24 worked under temporary contract.

The third quarter of 2021 achieved an additional step in the recovery of the European economy and labour market. Most countries moved forward and continued to reduce social distancing measures generated by the health crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Other specific actions taken to soften the effects of the COVID-19 crisis on employment and businesses were progressively lifted, such as financial assistance to businesses in many EU Member States. The rebound of the economy was confirmed in this third quarter of 2021, and was clearly visible in the development of employment in comparison with the pre-COVID situation.

This article gives an overview of employment at EU level, as well as at national level in the individual Member States, three EFTA countries (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland) and one candidate country (Serbia). Results come from the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS). This article depicts employment in general and specifically by gender, age and level of educational attainment. A specific focus is also dedicated to temporary contracts and part-time work in the three first quarters of 2021.

This article is part of the publication Labour market in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Full article

Main facts in the third quarter of 2021

In the third quarter of 2021, the share of employed people in the total population aged 20 to 64 reached 73.6 % at EU level. In the Netherlands, Sweden, Germany and Czechia, more than 8 in 10 people aged 20 to 64 were employed (employment rates amounted to 82.7 %, 81.0 %, 80.4 % and 80.2 % respectively) while the share of employed people stood below 70 % in Italy and Greece (both with 63.3 %), Romania (67.3 %), Croatia (67.9 %) and Spain (68.0 %).

The total employment rate masks significant difference between men and women. At EU level, while 79.0 % of men aged 20-64 were employed, the employment rate of women was equal to 68.3 %. Therefore, the gender employment gap reached 10.7percentage points (p.p.) in the third quarter of 2021.

Figure 1 shows that the employment rate varies across countries as well as between men and women in many EU Member States. In all EU Member States, the share of employed men was higher than the share of employed women. Although the three widest gender employment gaps were observed in countries with the lowest employment rates, this relation is not universal. The largest differences between the employment rate of men and women were found in Romania, Italy, Greece and Malta, all showing a gender employment gap of 18 p.p. in the third quarter of 2021. In contrast, Finland, Lithuania, Estonia, Sweden and Latvia recorded the narrowest gaps between men and women, all below 5 p.p. Czechia, Malta and the Netherlands reported the highest employment rates of men, with 87.4 %, 87.0 % and 86.4 % respectively, while the highest female employment rates were found in the Netherlands (79.0 %), Sweden (78.7 %) and Lithuania (77.8 %).

Figure 1: Employment rate by sex and country, Q3 2021
(in % of the total population, age 20-64)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Most countries with a Q3 2021 employment rate above its pre-COVID level

In most EU Member States employment recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic strongly hit EU employment in the second quarter of 2020. At EU level, the employment rate decreased by 2.2 p.p. from Q4 2019 (last quarter before the pandemic) to Q2 2020. In all EU Member States, the employment of people aged 20-64 stepped back, see Figure 2A. The largest decreases were recorded in Greece (-7.7 p.p.), Ireland (-5.9 p.p.) and Spain (-4.8 p.p.). In Austria, Estonia and Italy, the employment rate also changed significantly but to a lesser extent (between -4.0 p.p. and -3.0 p.p.). By contrast, the employment rate in the Netherlands, Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary, Latvia, Denmark and Croatia dropped by less than 1 p.p. over the same period.

Looking at Figure 2B, that compares Q4 2019 (the pre-COVID level) to the situation in Q3 2021, it is clearly visible that in most countries, and also at EU level, the employment rate of people aged 20-64 in Q3 2021 exceeded the rate recorded in Q4 2019. At EU level, the employment rate reached 73.6 % in Q3 2021 against 72.9 % in Q4 2019. A positive change was also recorded in 17 EU Member States. The most substantial increases were found in Poland (+3.0 p.p.) and Slovenia (+2.1 p.p.). Important increases, i.e. lower than 2 p.p. but higher than 1 p.p., were also reported by Luxembourg, Greece, the Netherlands, Romania, Hungary, Malta, Cyprus and Portugal.

However, in Q3 2021, nine countries did not yet recover from the pandemic in terms of employment; their employment rate was still below its pre-COVID level. In particular, Estonia and Latvia had their employment rate 2.2 p.p. and 1.6 p.p. respectively lower than in Q4 2019. Employment in Austria, Bulgaria, Italy, Sweden, Spain, Slovakia and Czechia had not yet reached either their pre-COVID level, but the difference between Q4 2019 and Q3 2021 was smaller than 1 p.p. Lithuania is the only country showing the same employment rate in both quarters.

Figure 2A: Development of the employment rate of people aged 20-64 between Q4 2019 and Q2 2020
(in % of the total population, seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Figure 2B: Development of the employment rate of people aged 20-64 between Q4 2019 and Q3 2021
(in % of the total population, seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Record-high employment rate in Q3 2021, except for young people

Looking at the employment rate by age group and by sex, Figure 3 shows significant differences from a category to another. Slightly more than 3 in 10 young people were employed in the EU in the third quarter of 2021 (31.0 % of women and 36.0 % of men aged 15-24). In comparison, more than 3 quarters of people aged 25-54 were employed (86.2 % of men and 75.6 % of women). For the age group 55-64, 67.4 % of men and 54.9 % of women were employed. It can be seen that the gender employment gap increases with the age, being the largest for the age group 55-64.

With regard to the long-term trend, youth employment as well as employment of men aged 25-54 recorded a downward trend from 2009 to 2013. Employment was more stable for women aged 25-54. All 4 categories started a long upward trend from 2014 to 2019, but then recorded a significant decrease in the second quarter of 2020 (further explained below). From then, the employment rate for these 4 categories increased steadily. For people aged 55-64, the evolution differs substantially as it increased almost constantly from 2009 to 2019, specifically for women. The employment rate decreased in Q2 2020 but not as much as for younger employed people. Both men and women aged 25-54 and 55-64 recorded their highest employment rate, for the whole period since Q1 2009, in Q3 2021 (see Figure 3).

The largest increase in employment rate from Q1 2009 to Q3 2021 was recorded by the senior age group (55-64); the increase amounted to 20.1 p.p. for women and 15.6 p.p. for men. Over the same period, the employment rate for people aged 25-54 also increased but to a lesser extent: +2.0 p.p. for men and +5.2 p.p. for women. For young people aged 15-24, the employment rate decreased by 0.4 p.p. for men and increased by 0.2 p.p. for women. This statement is further developed in the article on Participation of young people in education and the labour market

Looking closer at the impact of the COVID pandemic, young people were the most affected in terms of employment. From Q4 2019 to Q2 2020, the employment rate dropped by 3.7 p.p. for young women and by 3.0 p.p. for young men. Men and women aged 25-54 recorded a decrease of 2.3 p.p. over the same period, whereas the employment rate went down by 0.6 p.p. for senior women and by 1.1 p.p. for senior men. The younger the people, the more affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, among young people women were more affected than men, and among senior people men were more affected than women.

In Q3 2021, the employment rate of young people remained slightly below its level recorded in Q4 2019 (-0.3 p.p. for men and women aged 15-24). By contrast, the employment rate of people aged 25-54 exceeded by 0.8 p.p. for women and by 0.4 p.p. for men the pre-COVID rate. For people aged 55-64, the increase between Q4 2019 and Q3 2021 amounted to 1.9 p.p. for women and 1.5 nbsp;p.p. for men.

Figure 3: Evolution of employment in the EU by sex and age group, Q1 2009 - Q3 2021 (in % of the total population, seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

Comparing the EU countries, the largest disparities in employment rate were recorded for young people aged 15-24 (see Figure 4). In Denmark (54.5 %), Austria (51.8 %) and Malta (50.7 %), over half of the population aged 15-24 was employed in Q3 2021. This proportion reached even 73.5 % in the Netherlands. In contrast, employed people were less than one-fifth of young people in Italy (17.9 %), Bulgaria (16.2 %) and Greece (14.0 %).

Shifting the focus on the other age groups, Slovenia (89.3 %), Hungary (87.2 %) and the Netherlands (87.1 %) recorded the highest employment rates for people aged 25-54, while Spain (75.7 %), Greece (72.4 %) and Italy (70.6 %) reported the lowest. The employment rate for the seniors (aged 55-64) was the highest in Sweden (76.8 %), Estonia (73.8 %) and Germany (72.8 %), while the lowest rates for this age group were found in Greece (49.4 %), Luxembourg (44.3 %) and Romania (43.5 %).

Figure 4: Employment rate by age group and country, Q3 2021
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_emp_q)

In all countries the employment rate for people aged 25-54 was higher than for people aged 55-64, which was higher than for people aged 15-24. The Netherlands was an exception with a higher employment rate for young people (aged 15-24) than for senior people.

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

The employment evolution by sex and educational attainment level over the period Q1 2009 - Q3 2021 shows noticeable differences, both for men and women (aged 20-64), according to their level of educational attainment (see Figure 5). 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. at most upper secondary or post-secondary non-tertiary education) or low educational level (i.e. less than primary, primary or lower secondary education, at most). 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.

Another relevant finding is that the lower the educational attainment level, the wider the gap between the employment rates of men and women. This is true for the whole data series shown in Figure 5. The gender employment gap decreased over the period Q1 2009 - Q3 2021: from 23.2 p.p. to 21.9 p.p. for people with low level of education, from 12.4 p.p. to 11.7 p.p. for people with medium level of education, and from 6.2 p.p. to 5.2 p.p. for those with high level of education.

Figure 5: Employment rate by sex and educational attainment level in the EU, Q1 2009 - Q3 2021
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_educ_q)

After Q4 2019, due to the onset of the COVID-19, the employment rate started a downward trend, reaching its lowest level in Q2 2020. This is true for both genders and the three levels of education (low, medium and high). Women with medium level of education (-3.1 p.p.) and men with low level of education (-2.6 p.p.) had the most substantial decreases in employment from Q4 2019 to Q2 2020. Following the significant drop in Q2 2020, the employment rate began to recover. However, it could not reach its pre-pandemic levels (from Q4 2019) until Q2 2021. In Q3 2021, some groups had a slightly higher employment rate than in Q4 2019, namely men with low (+0.3 p.p.) and medium level of education (+0.1 p.p.), as well as women with medium (+0.2 p.p.) and high level of education (+0.5 p.p.). At the same time, in Q3 2021, men with high level of education had the same employment rate as in Q4 2019, and women with low level of education had still an employment rate lower than before the pandemic (-0.2 p.p. compared with Q4 2019).

Temporary contracts: young people mainly

As the employment rate dropped in particular for young people, it can be useful to see the distribution of temporary contracts among the age groups as shown in Figure 6. This shows that based on the average of the first three quarters of 2021, 60.1 % of the temporary contracts are held by people younger than 35 years. But employed people aged less than 35 years accounted for less one fourth (24.7 % exactly) of the total of the remaining employment (so other than temporary contracts).

Figure 6: Distribution of temporary contracts and of other contracts by age group and by sex, EU, average Q1-Q2-Q3 2021
(in % of the total, not seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsq_etgaed) and (lfsq_egaed)

Figure 7: Employment by temporary and other contracts by age group and by sex, EU, average Q1-Q2-Q3 2021
(in thousands, not seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsq_etgaed) and (lfsq_egaed)

From another point of view sown in Figure 7 showing the total employment by type of contract, sex and age group, it can be found that slightly less than half of young people aged 15-24 have temporary contracts. More precisely, at EU level, 48.9 % and 44.0 % of employed women and men aged 15-24 had a temporary contract. Among people aged 25-34, there is no difference between men and women at EU level as temporary contracts accounted for 19.0 % of the total employment for both sexes. Less than 1 in &à employed people had a temporary for the older age groups i.e. 8.5 % of women and 6.4 % of men aged 25-54 and 5.6 % of women and 4.6 % of men aged 55-64, the latter recorded the lowest share among all categories. Women show also a share higher than men for all age groups. However, even if globally, most countries follow the EU pattern, we will see that the share of temporary contracts among young people varies a lot from a country to another, especially for people aged 15-24.

Furthermore, Figure 8 addresses the share of temporary contracts in the total employment for people aged 15-24 and people aged 25-34 by country. Temporary contracts accounted for half or more of the total employment of young women aged 15-24 in 10 out of 22 Member States for which data is available. Men showed a lower share of temporary contracts in the total employment compared to women aged 15-24 in 18 countries. On the first three quarters 2021, Slovenia, Spain, the Netherlands showed a very high level of temporary contracts among people aged 15-24 which accounted for more than 60 % of the employment. By contrast, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Slovakia do not have a share exceeding 20 % of temporary contracts in the total employment. As regards people aged 25-34, the picture is somewhat different. The female share exceeds the male share in 13 out of 23 EU Member States for which data is available so the gender difference is much less visible than for younger people aged 15-24. The share of temporary contracts accounted for more than 30 % of the female employment in Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands (resp. 38.3 %, 31.3 % and 30.6 %) and of the male employment only in Spain and Portugal (43.3 % and 32.9 %). By contrast, temporary contracts accounted for less than 10 % of employment for both men and women in Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Ireland.

Figure 8: Temporay contracts by sex for people aged 15-24 and 25-34, average Q1-Q2-Q3 2021
(in % of total employment, not seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsq_etgaed) and (lfsq_egaed)

Part-time employment: a female specificity

Based on the first three quarters, the share of part-time in total employment is higher for young women for which it reaches 40.2 % of the total employment and for older women who are one third (32.9 %) working part-time. But still, more than one fourth of employed women aged 25-54 (27.9 %) worked also part-time in Q3 2021. Only for young men, part-time is somewhat common as they were one fourth (24.7 %) working part-time in average in the first three quarters 2021. However, less than one in 10 men aged 25-54 (6.7 %) and 55-64 (8.6 %) are affected by part-time (see Figure 9).

Figure 9:Employment by part-time and full-time, age group and by sex, average Q1-Q2-Q3 2021
(in thousands, not seasonally adjusted data)
Source: Eurostat (lfsi_pt_q)

Source data for tables and graphs

Employment (general) Q2 2021: tables and figures

Data sources

All figures in this article are based on seasonally adjusted quarterly results from the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) except for the last section on the first and second generations of migrants.

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 the 27 EU Member States.

Country notes:

In Germany, the whole microcensus has been used to estimate a restricted set of indicators from the first quarter of 2020 for the production of LFS Main Indicators. These estimates have been used for both the publication of German results and the calculation of EU and EA aggregates. By contrast, EU and EA aggregates published in the detailed quarterly results (showing more and different breakdowns than the LFS Main Indicators) have been computed using only available data from the LFS subsample. As a consequence, small differences in the EU and EA aggregates in tables from both collections may be observed. For more information, see here. In 2021 Q1 only, data of one federal region, Bremen, is not included in the estimates, but national estimates are reweighted to respect population margins.
Spain and France have assessed the attachment to the job and included in employment those who have an unknown duration of absence but expect to return to the same job once the COVID-19 measures in place are lifted.

Definitions:

The concepts and definitions used in the Labour Force Survey follow the guidelines of the International Labour Organisation (ILO).

The migration status distinguishes between native-born people and migrants, and between the first and second generation migrants. Migrants are persons who established their usual residence in another country than they were born, for a period that is – or is expected to be – at least 12 months. The usual residence means the place at which a person normally spend the daily period of rest, regardless of temporary absence for purposes of recreation, holidays, visits to friend and relatives, business, medical treatment or religious pilgrimage or, by default, the place of legal or registered residence. Second-generation migrants refer to two different groups of immediate descendants of migrants. The first group, with a mixed background, is defined as persons who are born in the country of interview (native-born) and who have one foreign-born parent and one native-born parent. The second group, with a foreign background, is defined as persons who are native-born, with both parents being foreign-born.

Different articles on detailed technical and methodological information are linked from the overview page of the online publication EU Labour Force Survey.

Seasonally adjustment models: The methodological choices of Eurostat in terms of seasonal adjustment in the COVID period are summarised in the methodological paper: "Guidance on time series treatment in the context of the COVID-19 crisis". These choices assure the quality of the results and the optimal equilibrium between the risk of high revisions and the need for meaningful figures, as less as possible affected by random variability due to the COVID shock.

Context

The COVID-19 pandemic hit Europe in January and February 2020, with the first cases confirmed in Spain, France and Italy. COVID-19 infections have been diagnosed since then 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 2020, most countries closed retail shops, with the exception of supermarkets, pharmacies and banks. Bars, restaurants and hotels were also closed. In Italy and Spain, non-essential production was stopped and several countries imposed regional or even national lock-down measures which further stifled 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 over 50) banned in most EU Member States.

The majority of the preventive measures were initially introduced during mid-March 2020. Consequently, the first quarter of 2020 was the first quarter in which the labour market across the EU was affected by COVID-19 measures taken by Member States.

In the following quarters of 2020, as well as 2021, the preventive measures against the pandemic were continuously lightened and re-enforced in accordance with the number of new cases of the disease. New waves of the pandemic began to appear regularly (e.g. peaks in October-November 2020 and March-April 2021). Furthermore, new strains of the virus with increased transmissibility emerged in late 2020, which additionally alarmed the health authorities. Nonetheless, as massive vaccination campaigns started all around the world in 2021, people began to anticipate improvement of the situation regarding the COVID-19 pandemic.

The quarterly data on employment allows to regularly report on the impact of the crisis due to the COVID-19 pandemic on employment. This specific article depicts employment in general and specifically by gender, age and level of educational attainment; it moreover provides results on the temporary contracts and part-time work and presents for the first time quarterly employment rates for the first and second generations of migrants. Another article focuses on the employed people and job starters by sector of economic activity and occupation.

Please note that in this exceptional context of the COVID-19 pandemic, employment and unemployment as defined by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) are not sufficient to describe the developments taking place in the labour market. In the first phase of the crisis, active measures to contain employment losses led to absences from work rather than dismissals, and individuals could not look for work or were not available due to the containment measures, thus not counting as unemployed. Only referring to unemployment might consequently underestimate the entire unmet demand for employment, also called the labour market slack, which is further analysed, with namely the evolution of the total volume of working hours, in the publication Labour market in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic.