Latvia - 1

Title of the survey

Survey on work.

Organization responsible

Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia.

Periodicity of the survey

Public sector: monthly.

Private sector: quarterly.

Objectives of the survey

To obtain information on the number of employees, gross and net earnings and hours actually worked.

Main labour topics covered by the survey

Employment, earnings and hours of work (and in addition, information about absence from work due to illness, maternity and child-care leave).

Reference period

Employment and earnings: the month.

Hours of work: the whole quarter.

Coverage of the survey

Geographical

The whole country.

Industrial

All branches of economic activity, excluding private farms.

Establishments

All types and sizes of enterprises, companies and establishments (see also sample design).

Persons

Employees including non-resident workers.

Occupations

Data are not collected by individual occupation.

Concepts and definitions

Employment

Employees are defined as all persons having signed an employment contract with an institution, enterprise, office or organisation. They include working directors, wage earners, salaried employees, apprentices, trainees, workers on probation and piece workers; commission agents, home workers, temporary and seasonal workers. Persons temporarily absent from work because of paid or unpaid vacation, temporary or indefinite lay off, industrial dispute and persons temporarily present on payroll during notice period preceding retirement, resignation or dismissal are also included.

Excluded from employees are casual workers and workers sub-contracted from other enterprises or temporary work agencies.

Part-time employees are employees whose regular working hours are less than customary working hours, whether daily, weekly, or monthly as agreed.

Non-residents are aliens that have been granted a work permit for less than one year in Latvia according to the regulations of Legislative Acts.

Since 1999, data are also collected on the number of employers, self-employed and unpaid contributing family workers.

Employment data are collected separately for employees with tax books (i.e. on main job) and employees with annual tax cards (i.e. on second job).

The first quarter of each year, employment data are collected by sex (i.e. total number of employees, of which women).

Earnings

Data are collected on the total gross and net earnings of employees present on the payroll during the reference month.

Gross earnings (i.e. before deduction of employees' contributions to social security schemes, pension funds and similar schemes, and employees' personal income taxes) comprise:

direct wages and salaries for time worked or work done (including overtime pay, premium pay for shift, night or holiday work, commissions, and regular bonuses, such production bonuses and others);
remuneration for time not worked (annual leave, vacation, public holidays and other time off with pay, as well as additional holiday pay and sick pay for medical certificate A, i.e. up to 14 days);
irregular bonuses and premiums (year-end, seasonal and similar bonuses); as well as dismissal benefits in case of reduction of staff or liquidation of the enterprise; and
the value of payments in kind (food and drink, fuel, housing, etc.).

Excluded from earnings are: cost of living, housing, transport and family allowances, as well as profit-sharing bonuses.

Net earnings are obtained by deducting from gross earnings employees' income taxes and social security contributions.

Every month, information is collected on earnings from the public sector. Every quarter, data are collected from the private sector.

Earnings data are collected separately for employees with tax books (i.e. on main job) and employees with annual tax cards (i.e. on second job).

The first quarter of each year, earnings data are collected by sex (i.e. for all employees, of which women).

Wage / salary rates

Not relevant.

Hours of work

Information is collected on the total number of days and hours actually worked per quarter.

Days actually worked refer to all the days an employee has worked or has been on business trip, whatever the number of hours performed.

Data are collected on the total number of hours actually worked per quarter, separately by all employees (part- and full-time workers) and apprentices. These include normal hours of work; overtime; time spent at place on preparation of workplace, repair, maintenance, preparation and cleaning of tools, preparation of receipts, time sheets, reports; time spent at place of work during which no work is done but for payment which payment is made under a guaranteed employment contract; and time corresponding to short rest periods at the workplace including tea or coffee breaks.

Hours actually worked exclude hours paid for but not worked (for holidays, vacation, sick leave, time off, etc.).

Data are collected separately for employees with tax books (i.e. on main job) and employees with annual tax cards (i.e. on second job).

International recommendations

The definitions of earnings and hours actually worked comply with the international recommendations.

Classifications

Industrial

The survey data are classified according to the Standard Classification of Economic Activities of the European Communities (NACE, Rev. 1) at the two-digit level. The NACE Rev.1 is based on the International Standard Industrial Classification of all economic activities (ISIC), Rev.3, 1990.

Occupational

Not relevant.

Others

The data are classified by region, type of ownership and sector (public and private). Employment and earnings data are classified by sex (1st quarter of each year). Employment, earnings and hours data are classified by main and second job.

Sample size and design

Statistical unit

The survey unit is the enterprise.

Survey universe / sample frame

The sample is selected from the Business Register, which is updated on a continuous basis. In 1998, it contained 36,833 enterprises:

5,888 enterprises with more than 20 employees or net turnover of more than 200,000 Lats;
1,880 budgetary organisations;
29,065 enterprises with less than 20 employees.

Sample design

The survey is based on single stage stratified random sampling. For Riga, enterprises are stratified by economic activity (according to 176 NACE groups at the 2, 3 or 4-digit level) and size class. For the rest of the country, stratification is by economic activity (according to 7 NACE groups: A, B, C+D+E, F, G+H, I and others), administrative territory (32 territories) and size class. All enterprises with 20 or more employees or with an annual turnover of at least 200,000 Lats are included with certainty in the sample, while the remaining enterprises are sampled. The sampling fraction varies from stratum to stratum, ranging from 1 in strata with a small number of enterprises, to about 10/100 in large strata.

In 1998, 5,888 enterprises with more than 20 employees and or net turnover of at least 200,000 Lats were approached, and 4,052 enterprises with less than 20 employees were sampled.

The sample is updated each year. In strata with a small sampling fraction, approximately 50% of the previous year sample is kept in the new sample. In such strata, each unit is surveyed for two consecutive years.

Field work

Data collection

It takes place by mailed questionnaires which are to be returned to the local department or the main office of the CSB by the 10th of the month following the survey reference period.

Survey questionnaire

This consists of four main sections. Sections 1 and 2 are designed to collect information on earnings and employment, and sections 3 and 4, on the number of different categories of employed persons as well as on working time.

Enterprises are asked to supply the following information:

Number of employees with tax books, in the reference month, out of which part-time, for whom earnings have been paid; calculated gross earning; compensation to employees for sick leave certificate A and net earnings;
Total number of employees on the first and last working day of the reference month, separately with tax books and annual tax cards, of which women on maternity leave; persons on unpaid leave and child-care leave, and persons who did not work full-time according to labour contract;
Total number of persons employed (not included above), in the reference quarter, by category (employers, self-employed, unpaid contributing family workers) and total calculated gross earnings of employees with annual tax cards by components; number of non-residents at the end of the reference quarter and the corresponding gross earnings in the reference quarter;
Number of days and hours actually worked in the reference quarter; number of calendar days of sick leave certificate B (over 14 days); other working time lost, separately for employees with tax books and employees with annual tax cards.

Explanatory notes on definitions are provided, where appropriate, in the questionnaire.

Substitution of sampling units

If a unit has not responded, it is removed from the sample without replacement.

Data processing and editing

The data are coded and processed by computer. The questionnaires are first checked by CBS statisticians. In case of missing or inconsistent data, contacts are made by mail or telephone. Consistency and logic checks are also carried out by computer.

Types of estimates

Totals and averages.

Employment and earnings: per month

Hours of work: per week.

Distribution of employees by level of earnings.

Part-time employees are converted to full-time equivalents on the basis of hours actually worked.

Construction of indices

Indices of average wages and salaries of employees in the national economy are computed, on the basis of 1990=100.

Weighting of sample results

Within each stratum, the weight of a survey unit is calculated as the ratio of the total number of enterprises in the stratum to the number of responding enterprises. Units that have gone out of business are considered as responding units. The Horvitz-Thompson estimator is used.

Adjustments

Non-response

An adjustment is provided for in the weighting procedure.

Other bias

None.

Use of benchmark data

None.

Seasonal variations

The survey results are not adjusted for seasonal variations.

Indicators of reliability of the estimates

Coverage of the sampling frame

The Business Register is assumed to include all enterprises in the activities covered by the survey. The under-coverage rate is estimated from a business register survey.

Sampling error / sampling variance

In 1997, the standard error of estimates of employment was 0.2%

Non-response rate

In 1997, it was about 3% in terms of the number of enterprises.

Non-sampling errors

Not available.

Conformity with other sources

Comparisons with other sources are not made.

Available series

Number of employees, average monthly earnings and average weekly hours actually worked by economic activity.

History of the survey

The survey has been carried out since 1954. Beginning 1994, sampling was used for small enterprises (less than 20 employees).

Prior to 1997, an Annual Survey on Work was conducted, which is now discontinued.

Documentation

Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia: Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (Riga);

idem: Statistical Yearbook (ibid.).

The results are published within 24 calendar days after the reference period for the monthly and quarterly data and some eight and a half months for the annual data.

Data can also be made available on diskette, upon request.

Web-site: http://www.csb.lv

Confidentiality / Reliability criteria

In compliance with the Law On State Statistics (1997), all data collected are treated as confidential and used only for statistical purposes. No data are published for individual enterprises (except for the number of employees) or where there are only one or two enterprises in an industrial activity.

Other information

Data supplied to the ILO for publication

The following data are published in the Yearbook of Labour Statistics:

Paid employment and

Average monthly earnings of employees, by economic activity and in manufacturing, by industry group.

The corresponding monthly data are published in the relevant tables of the Bulletin of Labour Statistics.

Other sources of data

The Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia conducts another survey not described in this volume, the Survey on Occupations, the results of which are published in Statistics on occupational wages and hours of work and on food prices - October Inquiry results, a special supplement to the ILO Bulletin of Labour Statistics.