Quarterly Labour Cost Index (not seasonally adjusted, working day adjusted, seasonally adjusted)

National Statistical Institute

Statistics on Labour costs, Research and Development, Innovation and Information Society Department

Todor Davidkov

Head of department

2, P. Volov Str.; 1038 Sofia, Bulgaria

[email protected]

+359 2 9857 568

The data are collected from enterprises and organizations that perform economic activity in Republic of Bulgaria. Sources of information are: pay-roll sheets, presence and absence sheets, labour or non-labour contracts, management contracts, letters of appointment or discharge, applications for paid or unpaid leaves etc.

· National Classification of Economic Activities (NCEA-2003, for international use NACE.BG 2003);

· Classification of Economic Activities (CEA-2008, for international use NACE.BG 2008);

· Unified Classification of Administrative-Territorial and Territorial Units (UCATTU);

· Classification of territorial units for statistical purposes in Bulgaria (NUTS);

· National Classification of occupations and duties (comparable with ISCO08).

Covered are enterprises from all economic activities irrespective of their type of ownership and source of financing, which have at least one employee working under labour contract.

Employees are all persons who have a labour contract (fixed or permanent; full-time or part-time) with their employer by virtue of the Labour Code or the Civil Servants Act and who receive remuneration in cash or in kind for certain quality and quantity of work done.

The average monthly number of employees is the arithmetic mean value of the daily number of employees (sum of the daily number of employees divided by the number of days for the reference month). Part-time employees are converted into full-time equivalents.

Gross wages and salaries are the remunerations paid regularly to the employees by the employers before the deduction of any tax and social security contributions payable by the employees and withheld by the employers. Gross wages and salaries comprise of: basic wages and salaries for time worked or work done; payments for statutory, contractual or voluntary leave; payments for overtime, shift work, extreme working conditions, length of service; monthly, quarterly and annual bonuses.

The average monthly wages and salaries are calculated through dividing the total amount of wages and salaries costs accrued during the reference month by the average monthly number of employees under labour contract excluding those on maternity leave.

Occupied post - an occupied post is a post within the organization to which an employee has been assigned under labour contract. The number of occupied posts is corresponding to the number of employees at the last day of the reference quarter without those absent from work for a period longer than 3 months (maternity leave, sick leave, unpaid leave).

Job vacancy - a job vacancy is defined as a newly created, unoccupied or about to become vacant post: 1) which the employer intends to fill either immediately or in the near future (3-months) and 2) for which the employer is taking active steps to find suitable candidate from outside the enterprise and is prepare to take more steps. Under the term "active steps" are included the following activities: announcing the post in Employment Agency, media (TV, newspapers, internet), direct contact with possible candidates and announcing a vacant post open to competition.

The job vacancy rate measures the proportion of number of job vacancies and the total sum of number of occupied posts and number of vacancies.

Labour Cost Index (LCI) is defined as Laspeyres index of labour costs per hour worked with base year 2020=100. It is calculated broken-down by economic activity at NACE.BG 2008 section level.

The observation units are enterprises' companies, ministries, departments, political, religious, public and other organizations, that perform economical activities in Republic of Bulgaria and have at least one employee working under labour contract during the reference period.

Number of employees, job vacancies and wages and salaries data correspond to the enterprises with one and more employees from all economic activities.

Labour cost index refer to the enterprises with one and more employees from economic activities from B to S (incl. O) from NACE.BG 2008.

The whole country is covered.

2000 - 2023

· Not applicable - number of employees, wages and salaries, occupied posts, job vacancies and job vacancy rate;

· Labour Cost Index - base year 2020.

The data source is the quarterly sample survey on the Number of employees, time worked, wages and salaries and other labour costs.

Quarterly

Up to 2007 the survey is carried out exhaustively for the public sector units and by a sample for the private sector units. Since first quarter of 2008 a sample from the public owned schools and kindergartens is drawn and they are no longer exhaustively covered in the survey.

The data validation goes through three stages:

• At the data entry;
• At regional level by the NSI Regional Statistical Offices;
• At national level by the NSI Head Office.

The data processing goes through the following stages:

• On-line data entry;
• Data validation;
• Correction of errors and imputation of missing information using administrative sources;
• Calculation of weights and weighting the results;
• Producing standardized output tables with main survey results.

Labour Cost Index series are published in the following three forms:

• Unadjusted;
• Working day adjusted - excluding the effect of varying number of working days in the same quarters in different years as well moving holydays and leap-years;
• Seasonally and working day adjusted – seasonal adjustment is carried out on working day adjusted series. Seasonal adjustment is a process where the seasonal component is removed from the time series in order to better identify short-term developments.

According to Article 2, point 3 from the Law on Statistics the statistical information shall be produced in compliance with the following criteria for quality: adequacy, accuracy, timeliness, punctuality, accessibility and clarity, comparability and logical consistency.

Quality reports for the Labour Cost Index and Job vacancies are prepared every year by the end of August.

The users groups are defined on the basis of the received data requests. They can be classified in the following main groups:

• National authorities - ministries, agencies, councils, other government bodies and public institutions;
• International organizations - Eurostat, ILO etc.
• Social Partners - unions, employers' organizations;
• Private organizations, enterprises, media;
• Researchers and students.

Internal users: Labour Force Survey, National Accounts.

No information available.

Regarding the job vacancies and labour cost index the data are available in all requested breakdowns. For the number of employees and wages and salaries the data refer to the whole country and all economic activities.

100% for the information on number of employees, wages and salaries and job vacancies

75% for the labour cost index

The overall accuracy of the survey results depends of:

· Sample size. Each quarter at about 18 thousands enterprises are surveyed. Up to 2007 the survey is carried out exhaustively for the public sector units and by a sample for the private sector units. Since first quarter of 2008 a sample from the public owned schools and kindergartens is drawn and they are no longer exhaustively covered in the survey. The private sector sample is a stratified random sample without replacement. The stratification criteria used are: size of the enterprise in terms of employees, economic activity and NUTS 3 level. The sampling rates for the enterprises according to the number of employees are as follows: up to 49 employees - 5%, from 50 to 99 employees - 40% and 100 and more employees - 100% (census);

· Sampling frame. The sampling frame from which the survey sample is drown is taken from the annual exhaustive survey on Number of employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs for the year t-2 (the last available at the moment of sampling). The sampling frame is updated with information from administrative sources;

· Survey tools. The statistical form for the survey is available in electronic and paper format. In 2012 the survey become part from Information system Short-term Business Statistics, which is on-line based allowing 24 hours data collection and incorporates logical and arithmetic controls visible immediately during the data entry;

· Methods for errors identification and correction. The data processing goes through three main stages of validation: 1) data entry - 85 checks are included in the electronic form which control the plausibility of the inserted values and item non-response; 2) at regional level, the Regional Statistical Offices of NSI perform post-validation via 25 additional control incl. checks for coverage, extreme and missing values; 3) at national level, the Head Office of NSI performs additional validation as well for coverage and completeness. Comparability is made with administrative and other sources.

Coefficients of variation and confidence intervals are calculated for assessment of stochastic reliability of the estimation for main indicators. For the third quarter of 2022 for the private sector they are:

The non-response rate for the third quarter of 2022 is 5.8%. The reasons for non-response are rather due to the use of old sampling frame i.e. inclusion in the sample of dead enterprises, enterprises with frozen activity, without employees, out of date contact information etc. rather than explicit refusals.

Unit non-response adjustment is done by re-weighting - sample size is replaced with the number of the responded units in the calculation of weights. Information from administrative Register of Insured Persons is used as well.

The target population for the survey is all enterprises with one or more employees under labour contract. In the survey sample 300 enterprises (1.5% from enterprises in the sample) were inactive or without employees.

1.5%

The administrative Register of Insured Persons from the National Social Security Institute is used mainly for reducing unit non-response. The data for around 560 refusing enterprises, 2.7% from the total number of surveyed enterprises, is imputed from the administrative register each quarter.

The average annual number of employees under labour contract is collected in rounded whole numbers.

The main reasons for non-response are rather due to the use of old sampling frame i.e. inclusion in the sample of dead enterprises, enterprises with frozen activity, without employees, out of date contact information etc. rather than explicit refusals.

5.8%

Not calculated. The logical and arithmetic controls do not allow missing information for the main variables in the survey.

After consolidation of the regional data into national database checks are done for duplicated records.

The data for around 250 refusing enterprises, 1.2% from the total number of surveyed enterprises, is imputed from the administrative register each quarter.

Not applicable

Labour Cost Index series are published in the following three forms:

• Unadjusted;
• Working day adjusted - excluding the effect of varying number of working days in the same quarters in different years as well moving holydays and leap-years;
• Seasonally and working day adjusted – seasonal adjustment is carried out on working day adjusted series. Seasonal adjustment is a process where the seasonal component is removed from the time series in order to better identify short-term developments.

The data revision means that different estimations for one and the same indicator are presented in different point of time. The main purpose of the revisions is to publish the best available estimates at the moment taking into account more exhaustive and with the better quality information available.

The population from which the survey sample for year t is drown contains all private sector enterprises that submitted annual balance sheets (incl. labour form) for year t-2 (the most recent available at the time of sampling) and the privatized enterprises during year (t-1). Due to the long period of time between the population from which the sample is made and the reference year two revisions of quarterly data are need to be done. The first revision is done when annual final data for year (t-1) are announced. Its aim is to update the population. The second one is imposed due to the impossibility to cover the newly established firms in time and it is done when annual final data for year (t) become available.

Number of employees - 3.2%

Average monthly wages and salaries - 0.2%

Monthly data on the number of employees and their average monthly and quarterly wages and salaries, job vacancies and the job vacancy rate are published 40 days after the end of I-st, II-nd and III-rd quarter. The IV-th quarter data are announced 45 days after the end of the reference period. The Labour cost index is published 80 days after the reference quarter.

40 days

24 months

The survey results are presented at the actual date set in the National Statistical Institute Release Calendar.

Normally there is no delay between the planned and the actual date of publication.

The national and regional statistical data on employees and wages and salaries are in compliance with the acting Classification of territorial units for statistical purposes in Bulgaria (NUTS). Labour Cost Index and job vacancies statistics are produced in compliance with the EU legislation therefore comparable at EU level as well.

Not applicable.

The comparability over time is disturbed by the changes of the Classification of Economic Activities. Up to 2007 NACE.BG 2003 was in force, since 2008 NACE.BG 2008 was implemented, which resulted in break of the time series for number of employees and wages and salaries. The Labour Cost Index series were back casted according to the NACE.BG 2008 as the time series begin from first quarter of 2000.

2000-2020

Coherence between the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and the survey on Number of employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs

The main difference between the both sources is due to the fact that the survey on Number of employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs collects information on the persons which have an employment contract according to the Labour Code or Civil Servants Act, while Labour Force Survey covers employees working by other type of contract or without any contract, as well the self-employed (working proprietors, own account works and unpaid family workers). LFS includes armed forces, but excludes persons on leave for raising a child up to two years of age.

Methodological differences such as: sampling unit, reference period, methods of data classification by economic activity, regional distribution (working place/ residence) etc. are potential reason for data discrepancies as well.

Coherence between the survey on Number of employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs and National Accounts

National Accounts as a system responsible for producing statistics with full coverage of the national economy and assuring comparability with the other main macroeconomic indicators is combining different sources in its estimates therefore the figures for employment, compensation of employees are different from the ones produced from the survey on employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs. There are differences in the definitions as well. The compensation of employees calculated by National Accounts includes payments which are not included in total labour costs such as: part of daily allowances for business travelling; provision of recreation or holiday facilities for employees and their families; costs related to employees working under non-labour contract and their earnings in the form of fees and commissions. National Accounts make additional adjustments for exhaustiveness on the following components: tips are estimated for activities like restaurants, bars, transport and other service activities (hairdressing and other beauty treatment); non-reported wages for employees working without any contract (informal employment).

The information on number of employees and labour costs is collected following the same definition and with same coverage (economic activities, regions, size classes) as in the annual census survey on Employed persons, wages and salaries and other labour costs.

Coherence between the survey on Number of employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs and National Accounts

National Accounts as a system responsible for producing statistics with full coverage of the national economy and assuring comparability with the other main macroeconomic indicators is combining different sources in its estimates therefore the figures for employment, compensation of employees are different from the ones produced from the survey on employees, wages and salaries and other labour costs. There are differences in the definitions as well. The compensation of employees calculated by National Accounts includes payments which are not included in total labour costs such as: part of daily allowances for business travelling; provision of recreation or holiday facilities for employees and their families; costs related to employees working under non-labour contract and their earnings in the form of fees and commissions. National Accounts make additional adjustments for exhaustiveness on the following components: tips are estimated for activities like restaurants, bars, transport and other service activities (hairdressing and other beauty treatment); non-reported wages for employees working without any contract (informal employment).

All indicators are internal coherent.

Press release with main results from the quarterly survey on Number of Employees, time worked, wages and salaries and other labour costs is prepared and published on the NSI official website. The results are published in compliance with the NSI Release Calendar.

Statistical Reference Book

Detailed results are available to all users of the NSI website under the heading Labour Market -Short-term statistics: https://www.nsi.bg/en/node/6398

Information System INFOSTAT: https://infostat.nsi.bg/infostat/pages/module.jsf?x_2=93

Access to anonymised micro-data can be granted for research and scientific purposes upon request and following the Rules for granting access to anonymised micro-data for scientific and research purposes set by NSI.

More detailed data, not published on the NSI web page can be prepared upon users' request according to the NSI Regulation for dissemination of statistical products and services.

Between 50 and 100 annually.

Methodological paper for the calculation of the average number of employees in full-time equivalents.

100%

· Labour Cost Index quality report;

· Job vacancies statistics quality report.

No information is available for the respondents’ burden.

· Law on Statistics;

· Regulation (EC) N0 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2009 on European statistics (provision 24 and Article 20 (4)) (OJ L 87, p. 164), stipulates the necessity to establish common principles and guidelines ensuring the confidentiality of data used for the production of European statistics and the access to those confidential data with due account for technical developments and the requirements of users in a democratic society.

Individual data are not disseminated following the rules set in Article 25 from the Law on Statistics. The dissemination of individual data is done only under Article 26 from the same law.