Wages and salaries
Statistical activity code: 21101
Monthly data: average monthly gross wages (salaries). Quarterly and annual data: average monthly gross wages (salaries), average monthly labour cost per employee, average hourly gross wages (salaries), average hourly labour cost by main economic activity (EMTAK 2008), by county, by type of owner; amount of gross wages (salaries) by main economic activity (EMTAK 2008); worked hours per employee by economic activity (EMTAK 2008), by county, by type of owner; average number of employees in full-time units by economic activity (EMTAK 2008). | |
Estonian Classification of Economic Activities (EMTAK 2008) based on NACE Rev. 2. Tables WS001, WS002, WS004, WS005 and WS007 show the letter level and table WS003 shows the two-digit EMTAK. Classification of Estonian administrative units and settlements (EHAK) Type of owner | |
Economically active units – enterprises, institutions, organisations (excl. economic units without employees) | |
Average hourly gross wages and salaries – payments to employees for time actually worked divided by hours actually worked. Average hourly gross wages and salaries of male employees – average hourly gross wages and salaries of female employees / average hourly gross wages and salaries of male employees * 100. Average hourly labour costs – payments to employees for time actually worked; remuneration for time not worked; employers pay in the event of sickness, occupational accident and occupational disease; payments in kind, which include indirect benefits to employees; payments to employees’ savings schemes; employer’s imputed social contributions; employer’s statutory, collectively agreed, contractual and voluntary contributions paid to social security schemes divided by hours actually worked. Average monthly gross wages and salaries – payments to employees for time actually worked and remuneration to employees for time not worked divided by the average number of employees converted to full-time units. Average monthly labour costs per employee – payments to employees for time actually worked; remuneration for time not worked; employers pay in the event of sickness, occupational accident and occupational disease; payments in kind, which include indirect benefits to employees; payments to employees’ savings schemes; employer’s imputed social contributions; employer’s statutory, collectively agreed, contractual and voluntary contributions paid to social security schemes divided by the average number of employees converted to full-time units. Basic wage or salary together with monthly bonus and premium – time wage and piecework pay calculated based on the remuneration determined in an employment contract or legal acts together with regularly paid bonus. Regularly paid bonus includes monthly premiums and bonuses, additional remuneration for work in difficult or health damaging conditions, remuneration for qualification, language skills and seniority, if the calculation is based on the time actually worked. This does not include remuneration for overtime hours or special bonus for working in shifts, in night shifts and on public holidays, irregular payments and premiums, in-kind remuneration, regular quarterly premiums (payment per performance) and other non-regular (lump sum) premiums and bonuses and payments for days not worked. Bonus for working in shifts, in night shifts and on public holidays – bonus for working in shifts, in the evenings, at night, weekends or on public holidays, if such instances are not considered as overtime hours. Earnings related to overtime – wage or salary for the number of hours worked over standard working hours. Employee – a person with whom a contract has been concluded for a fixed or unfixed period (incl. contracts of seasonal work); a person working under Public Service Act or a service contract. Full-time employee – an employee who has a 40-hour working week or whose working week has been shortened according to legislation (minor, persons who work in difficult or health damaging conditions, teachers, etc.) and internal work procedure rules. Gender pay gap – shows the difference between the hourly wages and salaries of men and women in percentages. Irregular bonuses and premiums – all irregularly paid bonuses and premiums: quarterly bonus, annual bonus, Christmas bonus, payment per performance and other irregularly paid additional bonuses and premiums (incl. holiday bonus, unused holiday allowance). This does not include regular (monthly) premium or bonus, social benefits in the event of a jubilee, birth, death, etc. Number of hours worked – hours actually worked, incl. time spent on tasks such as work preparation, repairing and cleaning equipment and devices, completing job tasks and reports; time spent at the place of work but not worked, e.g. machine stoppages, tea and coffee breaks, and overtime hours. Pay for time actually worked – time-rate and piece-rate pay; additional remuneration for overtime work, shift work, night work and holiday work; additional remuneration for work in difficult and unhealthy conditions, regular additional remuneration for qualifications, language and length of service, etc. This also includes premiums and bonuses (monthly, quarterly and annual bonus, Christmas benefit, cost of living compensation, etc.), if the calculation of these payments is based on the time actually worked. Part-time employee – an employee who has a part-time working day, week or month; an employee who works part-time on the employer’s initiative. Remuneration for time not worked – all holiday pays and special holiday pays (e.g. for marriage, death of a family member, military service, child starting school) and other payments for time not worked, which, for instance, include pay for waiting time, payments for the time of strikes and lock-outs, degree and professional trainings, payment for the home on-call time of health care professionals for the time they were not called out. The questionnaire does not include holiday pay which is compensated from the state budget (child leave, paternity leave, disabled child parental leave, paid care leave, annual holiday leave of an employee with partial or no work ability or a minor employee). Remuneration to employees for time not worked – includes vacation pay and compensation; pay for stoppage of work, pay during strike and lockouts, partial pay for leave in the case of decrease in work volume or temporary decrease in orders, pay for time spent in vocational training and obtaining formal education. This also includes benefits and premiums (Christmas benefit, quarterly bonus, cost of living compensation, etc.), if the calculation of these payments is not based on the time actually worked, and payments in kind. Subsidies received from other organisations – wage subsidy for employers and gross wages and salaries for employees from appropriations (incl. grant projects, targeted projects, external aid projects). Wage subsidy is a subsidy paid to assist the employment of unemployed persons, which aims to support the access to employment of the long-term unemployed, young people, persons with reduced work capacity, beneficiaries of international protection or persons released from prison. Wages and salaries in kind (payment in kind) – non-monetary remuneration, e.g. remuneration in products or services; food and beverages, etc.; clothing and footwear, etc.; administrative and utility costs related to the housings of employees (electricity, gas, water, heating, etc.); products or services at discount prices; loan interest for the purchase of consumer goods paid by the employer; payment of housing loan interests; benefits for covering the costs related to accommodation and housing (e.g. rent); costs related to the administration of houses, apartments owned by the employer (maintenance repairs, insurance and administration costs); use of company car for personal use (incl. the share of personal use from the costs related to the company car, calculated as a proportional share from the costs related to the use of the vehicle, such as fuel, repair, maintenance and rent costs, insurance, parking, etc.); indirect benefits for own employees, e.g. benefits for travelling to and from work (monthly cards, bus tickets, etc.), benefits for child care, catering, sports and spare time, and payments to the labour union funds. Employees working under a contract of employment, contract of service or the Civil Service Act are covered. | |
Economic unit | |
Economically active units – enterprises, institutions, organisations (excl. economic units without employees) FRAME List of economically active units (excl. economic units without employees). The list is generated from the Business Register for Statistical Purposes. | |
Estonia as a whole – monthly data; quarterly and yearly data by main groups of economic activity (marked with an alphabetical code in EMTAK), by type of owner and for all surveyed enterprises (institutions, organisations) by 2-digit EMTAK code Counties – quarterly and yearly data (average monthly gross wages and salaries, average gross hourly wages and salaries, average hourly labour cost, average monthly labour cost per employee) | |
Average gross monthly and hourly wages and salaries in quarter 1992–… Average monthly labour costs per employee and hourly labour costs 2002–… | |
Not applicable |
The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 32, § 34, § 35, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. | |
The dissemination of data collected for the production of official statistics is based on the requirements laid down in §§ 34 and 35 of the Official Statistics Act. The principles for treatment of confidential data can be found here. |
Notifications about the dissemination of statistics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on 1 October, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month). | |
All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. If there is also a news release, it is published simultaneously with data in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8:00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar. |
The news release “Average wages and salaries” once a quarter and once a year. The news release can be viewed on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section News. | |
Not published | |
Data are published in the statistical database at https://andmed.stat.ee/en/stat under the subject area “Economy / Wages and salaries and labour costs / Wages and salaries / Annual statistics” in the following tables: PA001: Average gross wages (salaries), labour cost, hours actually worked and number of employees by economic activity section (quarterly) PA002: Amount components of gross wages (salaries) by economic activity section (quarterly) PA003: Average gross wages (salaries) and labour cost by economic activity (quarterly) PA004: Average gross wages (salaries), labour cost and hours actually worked by counties (quarterly) PA005: Average gross wages (salaries), labour cost and hours actually worked by type of owner of economic unit (quarterly) PA006: Average monthly gross wages (salaries) by economic activity section (monthly) PA007: Population, sample, respondents and response rate of wages (salaries) statistics by economic activity section (quarterly) PA5335: Gender pay gap by economic activity (EMTAK 2008), October | |
The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 33, § 34, § 35, § 36, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. Access to microdata and anonymisation of microdata are regulated by Statistics Estonia’s procedure for dissemination of confidential data for scientific purposes. | |
Data serve as input for statistical activities 20901 “Business register for statistical purposes”, 21106 “Labour cost index”, 21401 “National accounts (annual)”, 21405 “National accounts (quarterly)”, 21406 “Regional GDP”, 21407 “Sector accounts” and 50101 “Regional development”. | |
Regulation (EC) No 450/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 February 2003 concerning the labour cost index http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2003:069:0001:0005:EN:PDF Commission Regulation (EC) No 1216/2003 of 7 July 2003 implementing Regulation (EC) No 450/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning the labour cost index http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLEG:2003R1216:20090101:EN:PDF Commission Regulation (EC) No 224/2007 of 1 March 2007 amending Regulation (EC) No 1216/2003 as regards the economic activities covered by the labour cost index http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2007:064:0023:0024:EN:PDF | |
Quality report submitted to Eurostat. Data on the population, sample and respondents, and the error estimates are published in the Statistical Database. |
To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the EFQM Excellence Model, the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the requirements in § 7. “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act. | |
Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is overall evaluation using information gathered in each phase or sub-process; this information can take many forms, including feedback from users, process metadata, system metrics and suggestions from employees. This information is used to prepare the evaluation report which outlines all the quality problems related to the specific statistical activity and serves as input for improvement actions. |
Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications Government of the Republic Ministries | |
Since 1996, Statistics Estonia has conducted reputation and user satisfaction surveys. All results are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section User surveys. | |
In compliance with the rules (regulations) |
The type of survey and the data collection methods ensure sufficient coverage and timeliness. | |
As initial data have partly been collected with sample survey, all end results include sampling errors. Sampling errors can be estimated. Estimates of the sampling errors of all published figures are calculated using the CLAN software package. For the basic figures, the standard errors are published. With the help of standard errors, one can obtain confidence intervals. Example. The average gross monthly wages were 865 euros and standard error was 7 euros. The relative error is 7/865 × 100 = 0.8%. 95% probability confidence interval is obtained by subtracting from and adding to 865 the double standard error: 7 × 2 = 14; 865 - 14 = 851; 865 + 14 = 879. The true value of the average gross wages and salaries was between 851 and 879 euros with the probability of 95%. | |
The response rates in different groups are published in the Statistical Database. |
The definitions and classifications used in Estonia comply with international definitions and classifications ensuring international comparability of the data. | |
Data are comparable over time since 2008. Data for 2008–2011 are in Estonian kroons. Since 2001, the data have been converted into euros based on aggregate data (1 euro = 15.6466 Estonian kroons). Since 1999, health insurance benefit has not been included in the average gross wages and salaries. Changes in the average gross wages and salaries in 1999 have been presented in comparison with the data of the same period of 1998, which do not include health insurance benefit. The average hourly gross wages and salaries are not affected by this change in the law. Until 2018, the hourly wages partly included irregular bonuses, but since 2018, irregular bonuses have no longer been included in the calculation of hourly wages. | |
Labour cost statistics are closely related to other statistics in the same field. Coherence issues (differences in coverage, definitions and/or methodology) need to be taken into account when comparing data related to the same variables from different sources (labour cost survey, national accounts). | |
The outputs of the statistical activity are coherent. The higher-level aggregate data are calculated on the basis of detailed data according to calculation rules. Tables WS001, WS002, WS004, WS005 and WS007 take into account all units considered in compiling the statistics. Table WS003 only takes into account units in the overall sample, from 2020 onwards, enterprises with 50 and more employees. The published average gross wages and salaries and labour costs have been converted to full-time units, which allows comparing different average wages and salaries and labour costs regardless of the length of working time. |
The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described in the section Principles of dissemination of official statistics of the website of Statistics Estonia. | |
The published data may be revised if the methodology is modified, errors are discovered, new or better data become available. |
SURVEY DATA Total population is 81,500 objects. The sample includes 1,875 objects per month and 5,125 objects per quarter. As a sampling frame, the statistical profile based on the database of the Ministry of Justice Centre of Registers and Information Systems is used; the statistical profile is updated every year and a stratified simple random sample is drawn. Enterprises, institutions and organisations with at least 50 employees are completely enumerated. The remaining part of the population is divided into two: enterprises with 1–9 employees and enterprises with 10–49 employees. Since 2018, the population has included economic entities with at least one salaried employee; earlier the population was formed on the basis of economic entities with at least one employed person. In addition, since 2018, non-profit organisations and foundations with less than 50 employees have been included in the population. From 2020, only those enterprises with at least 50 employees are included in the whole sample. Previously, there were also state and local government units with less than 50 employees. ADMINISTRATIVE DATA Data from the employment register of the Estonian Tax and Customs Board are used to pre-fill in the questionnaires. DATA FROM OTHER STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES Not used | |
Monthly | |
Data are collected and the submission of questionnaires is monitored through eSTAT (the web channel for electronic data submission). The questionnaires have been designed for independent completion in eSTAT and include instructions and controls. The questionnaires and information about data submission are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section Questionnaires. Starting from 2018, it is possible to submit wages and salaries and labour costs data directly from accounting software. Data are collected with the monthly official statistics questionnaire “Wages and salaries and labour force”. The data from the Tax and Customs Board are received via X-Road and an FTP-server. | |
Arithmetic and qualitative checks are used in the validation process, including checking that the population coverage and response rates are as required, comparison with the data of previous periods or other surveys and with administrative data sources. | |
As the sample is drawn by economic activity, poststratification is used for calculating data by county and by type of owner of enterprise. It is now possible to compare the average gross wages and salaries by county and type of owner of enterprise with the average gross wages and salaries of the country. The initial data of the stratum investigated by sample survey are extrapolated as follows: the expansion rate is the ratio between the volume of the population of entities in the particular economic entity investigated by sample survey and the number of respondents, which is multiplied by the data of every entity investigated by sample survey. Such extrapolation includes dealing with non-response in the stratum of enterprises investigated by sample survey: it is assumed that among the non-respondents of each stratum there are relatively as many economically active units as among the respondents of this stratum. For each such hypothetical entity, average indicators are calculated on the basis of active respondents. The completely enumerated stratum is not extrapolated, but the missing data of non-respondents are imputed before processing. The missing data of non-respondents with less than 100 employees are imputed by using the hot deck method – the missing data of the entity are imputed by the data of the nearest similar entity preceding in the data file. If the number of employees of a non-respondent is larger than 100, the missing data of this entity are imputed by the data of the previous period of the same entity. | |
Not applicable |
Since 2018, the samples of statistical activities 21101 “Wages and salaries” and 21104 “Job vacancies and labour turnover” and questionnaires (1085, 1380, 1364, 1379) are merged. Since 2018, the population includes economic entities with at least one employee (previously the population was based on persons employed), non-profit associations and foundations with less than 50 employees are added to the population and the sample has been optimized. Since 2018, data are requested with new questionnaire 1462 “Wages and salaries and labour force”, while previously questionnaires 1085 “Wages and salaries” and 1380 “Wages and salaries by county” were used. |