Ireland (2)

Title of the survey

EC (European Community) Labour Cost Survey

Organization responsible

Central Statistical Office (CSO)

Periodicity of the survey

Every four years.

Objectives of the survey

To estimate labour costs in the industrial sector, wholesale and retail trade (distribution), banking, credit and insurance.

Main labour topics covered by the survey

Employment, earnings, hours of work, labour cost, and enterprise practices with regard to employment schemes.

Reference period

The calendar year (1988, 1992) or the nearest 12-month period. As regards data on the number of full-time employees, the reference period is the end of each month of the reference year. The number of part-time employees and trainees and apprentices refer to the average number engaged in the reference year.

Coverage of the survey

Geographical

The whole country.

Industrial

The 1992 survey covered the following divisions: manufacturing; energy and water; construction; retail and wholesale distribution; hotels and catering; insurance, banking and finance; travel agencies and tour operators; and business services. In 1988, the survey covered the industrial, distribution, credit and insurance sectors (see under "History of the survey").

Establishments

Industry: enterprises with 20 or more employees. Services: enterprises with ten or more employees. Only enterprises which traded throughout the whole reference year are included. Enterprises which ceased trading during the year are not covered.

Persons

All employees.

Occupations

Data are not collected on individual occupations.

Concepts and definitions

Employment

Employees are defined as full-time or part-time workers who were paid a specific wage or salary or who had a contract of employment during the reference year. Family workers or directors not working for a salary, outside pieceworkers and staff working exclusively on commission are excluded. The following distinctions are made among employees:

Full-time employees, who are those who normally work 30 or more hours per week;
Part-time employees, who are those who normally work less than 30 hours per week, including persons who work only one or two whole days per week and those who work for part days;
Trainees and apprentices, who include apprentices bound to the firm by articles and employees whose wages and salaries are governed by the fact that they are being trained or are studying for any qualifications relevant to their trade or profession. Trainees and apprentices are not classified as employees and therefore not included in the denominators for the calculation of costs per employee.

In industrial enterprises, a further distinction is made between:

Manual employees (full- and part-time), who are workers who are directly engaged in the particular industrial activity. They include operatives, craftsmen, labourers, maintenance staff, drivers, cleaners, porters, etc.; and
Non-manual employees (full- and part-time), who are persons providing support activity (i.e. managerial, clerical, sales personnel, etc., supervisory staff and foremen).

Labour cost

Labour costs refer to all costs associated with labour and include the following components which are separately identified:

Total gross wages and salaries paid to all employees (excluding payments to trainees and apprentices), of which:
- regular wages and salaries, for normal hours and overtime, including regular bonuses paid each pay period,
- irregular and infrequent payments (premiums, bonuses, commissions, etc.),
- holiday pay for holidays, public holidays and other days not worked (e.g. funerals, marriages), compensation for holidays not taken and holiday bonuses,
- sick pay, including contractual or ex-gratia payments to employees out sick because of illness or accident, but excluding social welfare payments and other payments from privately organized funds,
- redundancy payments (i.e. lump sums less rebates received during the year).
Employers' contributions to Social Security, of which:
- statutory contributions under PRSI by employers;
- voluntary contributions and payments, which comprise pensions fund contributions by employers and life assurance premiums paid by employers; pensions paid directly to former employees by the employer; and sickness or injury insurance - including employers' liability insurance - and other payments of a social security nature (such as family allowances, payments on marriages, births).
Benefits in kind, of which:
- total expenditure for the provision and subsidization of employees' accommodation,
- other goods and services supplied free or at reduced rate to employees;
Other expenditure incurred by the firm, such as the cost of canteens, medical services, recreational facilities, protective clothing, scholarships (not job-related training), private use of company cars, cost of reduced-interest car loans, relocation of employees and transport between home and place of work.
Training costs, which cover:
- gross wages and salaries of trainees and apprentices,
- employers' contributions to their PRSI, cost of training courses (materials and equipment), scholarships for vocational or job-related training, etc., net of training grants or subsidies received.

Amounts received by the firms under the various state employment schemes (Employment Incentive Scheme, etc.) are deducted from the firms' labour costs in the analysis. Labour cost data are collected for all employees together, without any distinction by category or sex.

Hours of work

Annual hours of work are collected for full-time employees only, as follows: In industrial enterprises, data are collected on two types of annual hours of work:

total actual hours worked by all full-time manual employees in the year, or average actual hours worked per full-time manual employee: these include overtime actually worked, and exclude holidays, public holidays, paid or unpaid sick leave, meal breaks and travelling time between home and work; and
average usual annual hours worked per full-time employee, separately for manual and non-manual employees: these include paid sick leave and regular overtime, and exclude paid holidays, public holidays and short-time working.

In services, data are collected on average usual annual hours worked per full-time employee. Where necessary, enterprises may estimate usual average annual hours as average hours per week x 52 less paid holidays and eight public holidays. In all sectors, data are collected on average weekly hours worked per part-time employee.

International recommendations

The definition and components of labour cost comply with the international guidelines. In principle, all the components identified in the International Standard Classification of Labour Cost, where applicable, are covered by the definition. The concept of actual hours worked used in this survey corresponds to the definition of hours actually worked recommended by the international guidelines: they refer to the time worked during normal periods of work including overtime, and excluding hours paid for but not worked, such as paid annual leave, paid public holdays, paid sick leave as well as short breaks, namely meal breaks, travelling time between home and work, etc. The concept of usual hours worked is close to the the concept of hours paid for since it includes hours paid for but not worked due to sick leave; however, it excludes paid holidays, public holidays and hours lost in short-time working.

Classifications

Components of labour cost / compensation of employees

Data are classified by main components and sub-items of labour cost (see under Concept and Definitions).

Industrial

The 1992 survey used the General Industrial Classification of Economic Activities in the European Community (NACE), Rev.1, at the three-digit level. This classification is based on the International Standard Industrial Classification of all economic activities (ISIC), Rev.3.

Occupational

Not relevant.

Others

Data are classified by employment size groups (10-49 or 20-49; 50-99; 100-199 and 200 or more). In industry, employment and hours data are also classified by employee category (manual, non-manual and apprentices), by type of work (full-time, and part-time), and by sex. In services, data are broken down by type of work (full-time, part-time and apprentices) and by sex. Labour cost estimates are not broken down by employee category or type of work or sex.

Sample size and design

Statistical unit

The enterprise, defined as the smallest legally independent unit.

Survey universe / sample frame

This consists of a special Register maintained by the CSO, which covers all industrial enterprises with 20 or more employees, all retail and wholesale as well as banking, credit and insurance enterprises with ten or more employees; the frame is updated on a continuous basis. In 1988, it contained details on some 2,792 enterprises with an estimated total of 259,000 employees.

Sample design

The survey is based on a complete enumeration of enterprises within the scope of the survey.

Field work

Data collection

Data collection takes place during the first quarter following the reference year, by mailed questionnaire. A special team of temporary field officers is recruited to speed up collection of the questionnaires and, where necessary, to assist firms with their completion.

Survey questionnaire

Two types of questionnaires are issued: one is designed for industrial enterprises, the other, for services. Both questionnaires consist of two sections:

Section 1 collects information on employment, by type of work, employee category and sex;
Section 2 is used to provide information on total annual labour cost by components and hours of work (usual and/or actual annual hours).

Substitution of sampling units

Non-responding units are not replaced. Employment data for non-respondent enterprises is obtained from other CSO inquiries.

Data processing and editing

All returns are scrutinised for accuracy and firms are queried by post, telephone or field staff's visit regarding incompleteness, apparent inconsistencies, etc. Data are processed by computer; no coding is carried out. Inconsistent data are also checked on the basis of previous quarterly trends.

Types of estimates

Totals and averages of employment;
Average usual or actual hours of work;
Totals, averages and percentage distribution of labour cost;

In deriving average cost per employee, part-time employees are converted to wholetime equivalents on the basis of hours worked.

Construction of indices

Index numbers are not constructed.

Weighting of sample results

Not relevant.

Adjustments

Non-response

The method consists in compiling, for different size groups within each NACE sector, the ratio of employment in all enterprises in that cell to the employment in all respondent firms in the same cell. Employment data for non-respondent enterprises is obtained from other CSO inquiries.

Other bias

No adjustments are made for any other bias.

Use of benchmark data

Not relevant.

Use of other surveys

Not relevant.

Indicators of reliability of the estimates

Coverage of the sampling frame

Every attempt is made towards a full coverage.

Sampling error / sampling variance

Not relevant.

Non-response rate

In 1988, for the industrial sector, the non-response rate averaged 22 per cent in terms of enterprises with 20 or more employees, representing about 12 per cent of the total employment in those enterprises.

Non-sampling errors

The quality of data relating to hours worked is not considered to be as good as for the financial details returned in the survey. Comparisons of hourly costs between industrial sectors and previous surveys for these sectors are fairly reliable; however, the absolute levels of hours worked are less firmly based.

Conformity with other sources

The survey results are compared with trends in quarterly employment and earnings series.

Estimates for non-survey years

Estimates are produced for total hourly labour cost using changes in direct earnings and social security payments.

Available series

Published tables include, among others, total employment and total labour cost for all employees; average annual and hourly labour cost per employee; average annual, actual and usual hours of work per employee; average payment per hour for days work; percentage distribution of labour cost (by main components) by broad sector; etc. Data are cross-classified by NACE activity and enterprise size.

History of the survey

Previous surveys of labour costs were undertaken on a harmonized European Community-wide basis in respect of 1974 (services only), 1975 (industry only), 1978, 1981, 1984 and 1988. In 1988, the coverage of the survey was expanded to cover the banking, insurance and finance sectors, as well as wholesale and retail distribution. In 1992, it was further expanded to cover hotels and catering, travel agencies and tour operators, and business services. Prior to 1984, in the industrial sector, the survey covered establishments with 10 or more persons engaged. It is considered that this would not seriously affect any comparisons except in the case of NACE 36 (manufacture of other means of transport). For the distribution, credit and insurance sectors, the information was collected on actual hours of manual workers in 1978-1981, whereas, in 1984 and 1988, data was collected on usual hours of all employees. In 1988, only enterprises which traded out throughout the year were included; comparisons with 1984 are affected by this change because the 1984 results showed high levels of redundancy pay in certain sectors further to the inclusion of some enterprises which had ceased during that year.

Documentation

Central Statistical Office: Labour Costs Survey in Industry, Distribution, Credit and Insurance (four yearly, Dublin); published some two years after the survey reference year; however, details are available three months before the publication date. This publication contains methodological information on the survey. Published data may also be made available on magnetic tape or diskette upon request. Preliminary and final results of the EC Labour Cost Survey are also published by: EUROSTAT: Labour Cost 1988, initial results (Luxembourg, 1991).

(TO BE UPDATED WHEN THE 1992 idem: Labour Cost 1988, volume 1, principal results, and volume 2, results by size classes and by regions (ibid., 1992).

Confidentiality / Reliability criteria

In accordance with EC regulation 1612/88, employers are obliged to supply the CSO with the requested data. The information provided is treated as strictly confidential and used for statistical purposes solely. Besides, statistics in aggregated form only are forwarded for publication to the EC Commission.

Other information

Data supplied to the ILO for publication

Statistics of average hourly labour cost in manufacturing are published in Tables 22A and 22B of the Yearbook of Labour Statistics.