Panama

Source of the series

Lists of contributions of Social Security Institutions.

Title of the series

Employment Series.

Organization responsible

Data collection, statistical processing and publication/dissemination of the statistics:

Dirección de Estadística y Censo, Contraloría General de la República (Directorate of Statistics and Census, Comptroller General of the Republic).

Main topics covered

Employment and earnings.

Periodicity or frequency of availability of the statistics

Once a year.

Reference period

The month of August.

Coverage of the statistics

Geographical:

the whole country.

Industrial:

all branches of economic activity.

Establishments:

establishments of all types and sizes.

Persons:

employees paying social security contributions and employees of State institutions.

Occupations:

data are not collected on individual occupations or occupational group.

Concepts and definitions

Employment:

all employees who pay social security contributions, i.e. all persons who work for another person or entity and are remunerated in money, provided that they have worked on any day in the reference month.

Earnings:

gross cash monthly wages and salaries. This means the remuneration received by employees for their work in the reference period, including paid overtime, payment for time not worked and commissions.

Classifications

Branch of economic activity (industry):

Title of the classification:

Standard National Industrial Classification for all Economic Activities.

Number of groups used for coding:

18 categories.

Applied to:

employment and earnings in private companies.

Link to ISIC and level:

Rev.3 (1990) at all levels.

Occupation:

Title of the classification:

National Classification of Occupations.

Number of groups used for coding:

10 groups.

Applied to:

employment in autonomous institutions and banana zones.

Link to ISCO and level:

ISCO-1988 at all levels.

Other classifications:

by sex, type of enterprise/institution and sector.

Data collection

Data collection methods vary depending on the type of employer:

Private enterprises:the data are obtained from lists of contribution payments submitted by employers the to the Social Security Fund. The information relates to the month of August and its scope is at central level. The collection and processing of data takes approximately four months.

Banana Zones: the source of information is the payroll lists of employees in the Banana Producing Estates of Chiriquí and Bocas del Toro. The data collection and processing takes about two months.

Autonomous, semi-autonomous and municipal institutions: the information is obtained from a special list which is requested each month from every institution and which includes occupation, sex, wages of personnel working in them. The data collection and processing takes about four months.

Central Government: the data is contained in the employee payroll list prepared by the National Computer Directorate in the Comptroller-General's Office. Processing takes about one month.

Data processing, editing and consistency checks

The data are processed by computer and wage and salary ranges are checked manually.

Adjustments

None.

Types of estimates

Total paid employment and earnings, and distributions.

Construction of indices

None.

Indicators of reliability of the estimates

Not available.

Available series

Distributions:
  • Private companies: number of employees by sex and amount of earnings, by province, branch of activity and monthly wages;
  • Banana Zones: number of employees and amount of earnings, by monthly wages, sex, zone and occupation;
  • Autonomous, semi-autonomous and municipal institutions: employees by monthly wages, by sex, occupation and institution;
  • Central Government: employees by amount of wages and sex, by ministry and institution.

    History of the statistics

    Starting date of the statistical series:

    1958.

    Major changes and revisions:

    in the private enterprise sector, from 1980, the Social Insurance Fund introduced changes in the system of payment of contributions, from quarterly to monthly, using a pre-prepared list. The system produces changes in the figures, since employers submit this list to the Institution even though they do not make the corresponding payments. Prior to that, only the list of actual payments made was accepted.

    In the Banana Zones: up to 1976, to calculate the average monthly wage, all employees who worked during the reference month were included irrespective of days worked. From 1977, employees who worked less than 22 days in the month were excluded, so as to obtain an average monthly wage more representative of the activity.

    In the Canal area: the transfer of the administration of the Panama Canal on 31 December 1999 to Panamanian hands resulted in a significant increase in the number of employees and the amount of wages and salaries in the public sector.

    Documentation and dissemination

    Documentation:

    Contraloría General de la República, Dirección de Estadística y Censo: Situación Social – Estadísticas del Trabajo, Volumen II: - Empleo: Sector público y privado (Panama, annual); published approximately eight months after the data reference period.

    Data supplied to the ILO for dissemination

    None; distributions are not published in the Yearbook of Labour Statistics.