Archive:Employment rates – annual statistics
Data from April 2018.
Planned update of the article: April 2020.
Highlights
In 2018, the employment rate of persons aged 20-64 in the EU-28 was 73.2 percent, the highest rate ever recorded since 2005.
Thirteen EU Member States, four more than in 2017, have reached their EU 2020 employment rate goal in 2018.
Employment and the Europe 2020 strategy
In 2010, the European Council adopted the so-called Europe 2020 strategy EU 2020 strategy. The emphasis is on the reinforcement of the EU economy and to prepare for challenges of the next decade. With regard to employment, the aim is to increase the employment rate of the population aged 20 to 64 years to at least 75 percent by 2020. In addition, the EU Member States have [1] set national targets for the employment rate in 2020]. This article provides more insight in the progression towards the goals and aims related to developments in the area of employment. The employment rate gives information on the share of the adult population who have a paid job (in other words, is an employed person). They can be paid in cash or in kind and the person can have a job as an employee, as a self-employed person or as a family worker. In most cases, a paid job is an important indicator of the living standard of people and the employment rate mainly determines the socio-economic conditions of individuals in a country. Moreover, it provides key macroeconomic information as it describes to what extent human resources of a country are mobilized for economic purposes.
Full article
EU-28: persistent increase of high employment rate
In 2018, the employment rate of persons aged 20-64 in the EU-28 was 73.2 percent. This was the highest rate recorded since 2005. In 2008, exactly one decade ago, the great financial crisis took place. In that year the employment rate was 70.2 percent, with a drop in rate, the following years until 2013 (Figure 1).
The rate increased by 1.0 percentage points between 2017 and 2018. Since the adaptation of the EU 2020 strategy in 2010, the employment rate has grown almost 5 percentage points (4.7 percent), with the most persistent growth since 2014. Since than, there is a year-on-year growth of 1.0 percentage points on average. Moreover, EU-28 is just 1.8 percentage points removed from its 75 percent employment rate target.
For the coming two years, in order to reach the EU 2020 target, the employment rate growth will have to be maintained. When this will happen, it will be the longest and largest growth period since 2005.
Employment rates Member States compared
As shown on Map 1, there are notable differences in employment rates between the EU Member States. In 2018, there was a difference of 23 percentage points between the country with the lowest and the country with the highest employment rate. Greece is at the bottom end with 59.5 percent, and Sweden is at the top end with 82.6 percent. It is the only Member State with a rate above 80 percent.
In-between these two extremities there are two major groups of EU Member States: one with a rate ranging from 60 to 69.9 percent, and one within the range of 70 to 79.9 percent. Italy, Croatia, Spain, Belgium, and Romania are part of the first group, while the second group consists out of 21 EU Member States, including Germany, France, Portugal and the United Kingdom. In addition, the latter group also includes the majority of the Central and Northern European countries.
Thirteen Member States already achieved EU 2020 goal
As mentioned before, one of the targets of the Europe 2020 strategy is to have an employment rate of at least 75 percent for persons aged 20 to 65 years old. This objective has been translated into national targets that reflect the situation and possibilities of each EU Member State (Figure 2).
The national targets vary considerably across countries, ranging from 62.9 percent in Croatia to 80.0 percent in Denmark, The Netherlands and Sweden.
Thirteen EU Member States have already reached or even exceeded their national target in 2018: Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Lithuania, Sweden, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Malta, Croatia, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia and Slovakia. Five of them have already reached their target in 2015 and the number of countries reaching their goal is still counting: Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Austria, and Hungary are on average less than one percentage point away from their target, Romania is just 0.1 percentage point removed from its goal. Denmark, Finland and Cyprus have to bridge a difference of more than one percentage point until they have reached their target. Moreover, Sweden, while being one of the Member States with the highest national targets, achieved its goal six years ahead on schedule, and continues to maintain this growing tendency in 2018.
However, countries have followed different paths before they had reached their goal. Germany, the Czech Republic, and Malta are the only three countries that have had a steady upward movement over the last 14 years. Estonia, Ireland, Lithuania, Sweden, Latvia and Croatia had have ups and downs over the same period of time. Germany is the only country that have reached and has kept its target since 2013.
Although France, Belgium, Bulgaria and Italy have had a fluctuating to slow increase of the employment rate over the last years, since the last two to three years, they are now less than 5.0 percentage points away from their target. Spain is the only country that is 5 to 10 percentage points below its target and has experienced notable fluctuations over the past 15 years. In addition, Greece is more than 10 percentage points below its target and has been so since 2011.
Gender gap employment rate shrinking, but still lasting
The gender gap in employment, as well as the employment rate of men and women in each country is shown for 2005 and 2018 in Figure 3. Countries are ranked based on the size of the gender gap in 2018. As a reference, Lithuania has the smallest, and Malta shows the largest gender gap compared to the other EU Member States. The dots (women) and the lines (men) show the actual employment rate of the different years. The length of the black line indicates the difference between the employment rate of men and women (i.e. the gender gap). So, the longer the line between the values of men and women in the corresponding year, the larger the gender gap.
For EU-28, the gender gap has diminished in 2018 in comparison to 2005: from 16.0 to 11.5 percent. The decrease at EU-level is a result of the increase of employment among women. During the last decade, the rate among men has practically been unchanged and stabilised. Lithuania, Sweden, Estonia and Germany are the only Member States that have fulfilled the average EU-28 employment rate target (75 percent) for either sex in 2018. In contrast, Belgium, Hungary, Spain, Italy and Greece have not achieved that goal, neither for men nor women.
In comparison to 2005, in 2018, only Estonia, Poland, Hungary and Romania have an increased gender employment gap, while the majority of the EU Member States show a decrease. Although, over the same period of time, the majority of the EU Member States have increased rates for both sexes, there are some exceptions. Greece is the only country with a drop in employment rate for both men and women; Denmark, Luxembourg, Belgium, Cyprus, Spain, Ireland and Italy, on the other hand show increased employment rates for women, but decreased employment rates for men.
The decreasing gaps across countries can be explained by the following two factors: (i) in the first half of the countries, this is due to the growing employment rate of both men and women, with faster increases among women than among men, and (ii) in the second half of the countries, this is due to decreasing employment rates among men, with at the same time increasing rates among women.
Young people less, older people more in employment
The European Union has, in addition to the goal to increase the employment rate among women, also a policy target to increase the employment rate of older persons.
The increase in employment rate (2005 and 2018 compared) is proportional with age, as indicated in Figure 4: among persons aged 60-64 years the rate has increased with 17.7 percentage points, whereas among youngsters (20-24 years old) it has decreased with 1.0 percentage points. In 2018 the age groups from 30-54 years old are above the 75 percent EU 2020 target. in the same year, the highest employment rate is recorded in the group aged 40-44 years with 83.1 percent. This has been unchanged since 2005.
Large increase of highly educated persons in employment
In both 2003 as well as in 2018, persons with a medium level education (defined as upper secondary and post-secondary non-tertiary education, ISCED levels 3 and 4) constitute the largest proportion of those in employment. This has not been changed throughout the years (around half of the employed population). In comparison to 2003, in 2018, the group, consisting out of people with low level education, is decreased, whereas the group with high level education is increased. To be more exact: in 2003, one quarter of the persons in employment had a low level education, another quarter had a high level education. In 2018, this has shifted to one sixth and one third of the people with low level and high level education respectively.
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Moreover, the group of men with low level education, is the fastest decreasing group (- 8.1 million persons), and the group of women with high level education, is the fastest increasing group (+ 16.8 million persons). In 2018, there is a clear shift within the group with high level education; women outnumber men compared to the situation in 2003.
The evolution (2002-2018) of the number of employed persons in the EU, combined with the variables age, sex, and education are shown in Figure 7. A clear pattern is visible: over the years, the groups of younger age with low level education has decreased (upper left hand side), and the older age groups with high education has increased (lower right hand side). Also, for the whole time period, for all age groups, men outnumber women with respect to low level education, while, in the most recent years, young and middle-aged women outnumber men among those with high level education.
Overall, there has been a clear shift in the European labour market over the last fifteen years; with an increase in highly educated people, a notable rise in the employment of women and, in addition, a decrease in the participation of the youngest age group and a rise in the share of elderly.
Data sources
Source: The European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) is a large sample, quarterly survey providing results for the population in private households in the EU, EFTA and the candidate countries. Conscripts in military or community service are not included in the results.
Reference period: Yearly results are obtained as averages of the four quarters in the year.
Coverage:
France - since the first quarter of 2014 the overseas departments of Guadeloupe, Martinique, Guyane, and La Réunion are covered, in addition to the metropolitan territory. Overseas departments are included in the results of the detailed series, but not in the results of the main indicator.
Cyprus - the survey covers only the areas of Cyprus controlled by the Government of the Republic of Cyprus.
European aggregates: EU refers to the sum of EU-28 Member States and EA to the sum of the 19 euro area 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 survey follow the guidelines of the International Labour Organisation. Employment covers persons aged 15 years and over (16 and over in Spain, Italy and the United Kingdom, 15-74 years in Estonia, Latvia, Hungary, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark, and 16-74 years in Iceland), living in private households, who during the reference week performed work, even for just one hour, for pay, profit or family gain, or were not at work but had a job or business from which they were temporarily absent, for example because of illness, holidays, industrial dispute or education and training. The LFS employment concept differs from national accounts domestic employment, as the latter sets no limit on age or type of household, and also includes the non-resident population contributing to GDP and conscripts in military or community service. Definitions of indicators reported in this publication are available on the EU-LFS Statistics Explained webpage: EU Labour Force Survey (Statistics Explained)
Source data for tables and graphs
Context
Please note that Eurostat provides two sets of indicators linked to the annual employment rate, which serve different purposes and which in some cases differ from each other:
1) The main indicators, which are seasonally adjusted. They include the headline indicators under the EU2020 Strategy and are consequently used for monitoring the EU2020 targets (at EU and national levels). They have only a few breakdowns and normally refer to the age group 20-64. Please also note that for France the main indicators exclude overseas departments.
2) The detailed results, which are not seasonally adjusted. They have a large number of breakdowns and can therefore be used for more detailed analysis. These include the French overseas departments.
This article presents annual results for some indicators from the two sets described here above.
The article on Labour market and Labour force survey (LFS) statistics presents a series of other annual results of the LFS. For deeper insight into the labour market, this article should also be read together with Unemployment statistics and Underemployment and potential additional labour force statistics. The main source for the employment rate calculation is the labour force survey (LFS). The results from the survey currently cover all European Union Member States, the EFTA Member States of Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, as well as the candidate countries Turkey and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. The survey is based on the same target populations and uses the same definitions in all countries, which means that the results are comparable between the countries. Five different articles on detailed technical and methodological information is linked from the overview page EU labour force survey.
The 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. The EU-LFS is an important source of information about the situation and trends in the national and EU labour markets.
Each quarter around 1.8 million interviews are conducted throughout the participating countries to obtain statistical information for some 100 variables. Due to the diversity of information and the large sample size the EU-LFS is also an important source for other European statistics like Education statistics or Regional statistics.
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