Archive:Hours of work in detail - quarterly statistics
This Statistics Explained article has been archived - for recent articles on labour market see here.
Data extracted in April 2021
Planned article update: October 2021
Highlights
This article complements the article on Hours of work, with a more detailed analysis of the European Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) quarterly data on working hours in the main job. The number of average actual weekly hours of work in each of the four quarters of 2020 are, for example, compared between employees and self-employed persons, as well as across occupations.
Given the level of detail, data used in this article is not seasonally adjusted. For this reason (in order not to be biased by the seasonal effect), data from one quarter of 2020 (for example the first quarter of 2020) is compared with data from the same quarter of 2019.
Moreover, to increase the level of comparability between countries, the value of the average actual weekly hours of work for the total population in the quarter of 2019 under consideration has been fixed at 100 for the EU aggregate and for each country separately. Then, the average actual weekly hours of work for each subpopulation or breakdown, for both the quarter under consideration for 2019 and 2020, is compared with the value previously fixed to 100 (hours of work of total population in the relevant quarter of 2019) for the EU aggregate and for each country. This method allows a fair comparison of the different values of the index between the different subpopulations and also between the relevant quarter of 2019 and 2020 (as it eliminates the effect of a different measurement of actual working hours across countries).
The average hours of work are calculated for people who reported working hours of one hour and more in the reference week. The computed indexes consequently do not include those who were employed with zero working hours in the reference week. However, in this period of the COVID-19 pandemic, many businesses have been temporarily shut down, with people being absent from work and/or in temporary lay-off. To see the effect of the pandemic on the hours of work, the evolution of the number of persons included in the average (i.e. the number of persons having reported working hours in the reference week of one hour or more) should also be taken into account. For this reason, this article presents the index of average hours of work corrected for employment, which corresponds to an index of the volume of working hours.
The article is part of the online publication Labour market in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic - quarterly statistics and presents results on the hours of work (quarterly data) of the European Union (EU) as a whole, for all EU Member States individually (except Germany for which data is not yet available), as well as for the three EFTA countries (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland) and four candidate countries (Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey). Based on non-seasonally adjusted data, this article mainly compares data from all four quarters of 2020 with data from the corresponding quarters of 2019.
Full article
Malta has the largest gender difference in the change of total working hours between Q4 2019 and Q4 2020
When comparing the total volume of hours worked in each quarter of 2020 with the corresponding quarter of 2019 (see Figure 1), a decline can be observed for each of the four quarters of the year for the total EU population, with the largest drop recorded in the second quarter: -4.4 % in the first quarter (Q1 2020 versus Q1 2019), -15.0 % in the second quarter (Q2 2020 versus Q2 2019), -3.0 % in the third quarter (Q3 2020 versus Q3 2019) and -5.8 % in the fourth quarter (Q4 2020 versus Q4 2019).
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
The largest decreases in the volume of working hours for the first quarter, Q1 2020 compared with Q1 2019, were reported in Italy (-10.0 %), Slovakia (-8.9 %) and Croatia (-8.2 %). By contrast, the Netherlands, Romania (both -0.3 %) and Malta (-0.8 %) recorded the smallest decrease. No EU Member States saw an increase in their total volume of working hours in the first quarter.
As regards the second quarter (comparing Q2 2020 with Q2 2019), most EU countries suffered from a sharp fall in their volume of hours of work, with the sharpest falls in Spain (-26.7 %), Portugal (-26.1 %), Greece (-25.6 %), Italy (-23.2 %), Cyprus (-23.1 %) and Ireland (-22.1 %), and the smallest ones in Denmark (-3.7 %), Sweden (-4.9 %), Finland (-6.1 %) and the Netherlands (-6.5 %).
The third quarter (comparing Q3 2020 with Q3 2019) was the first quarter of the year where some EU countries recorded an increase in their total working hours: Luxembourg (+0.9 %), the Netherlands (+0.4 %), Slovakia and Czechia (both +0.1 %). Nevertheless, other EU countries still suffered from an decrease in their volume of working hours larger than 5%: Spain (-7.3 %), Portugal (-7.2 %), Ireland (-5.6 %) and Sweden (-5.3 %).
Finally, in the fourth quarter (comparing Q4 2020 with Q4 2019), two Member States saw their volume of hours worked rising: again Luxembourg (+0.7 %) and Denmark (+0.2 %). All other EU Members States experienced a decrease in their volume of working hours, with Austria (-11.7 %), Czechia (-11.6 %), Greece (-10.1 %), Slovakia (-9.4 %) and Ireland (-8.0 %) with the largest decreases.
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
Women were more affected than men by the COVID-19 crisis as regards their working time in the second quarter (comparing the total volume in Q2 2020 with Q2 2019), with a drop of -15.9 % for women and -14.6 % for men at EU level (leading to a gender gap of 1.3 percentage points (p.p.))(see Figure 2). However, no differences between men and women were observed in the first quarter, while the differences in the third and the fourth quarter were very small (-2.9 % for women versus -2.8 % for men in Q3, and -5.9 % for women versus -6.2 % for men in Q4).
In most Member States, the differences between men and women in the first quarter (comparing Q1 2020 with Q1 2019) were small. However, Luxembourg recorded a gender gap of 5.2 p.p. because the volume of working hours for Luxembourgish men decreased by -6.3 % and the volume for women by only -1.1 % (comparing Q1 2020 with Q1 2019). The gender gap was also important in Lithuania but here because the volume of working hours for women dropped by -5.6 % and men by only -0.9 %.
For the second quarter (comparing Q2 2020 with Q2 2019), the gender differences were again sizeable for Lithuania due to a larger decrease in the volume of working hours for women (-14.5 %) than for men (-9.7 %), leading to a gender gap of 4.8 p.p. Two other Member States displayed a similar gender gap: Poland (where the hours of work decreased by -11.5 % for women and by -6.7 % for men) and Greece (where the hours of work decreased by -28.2 % for women and by -23.7 % for men). Nevertheless, the largest gender gap in the second quarter was observed in Portugal: the volume of hours worked dropped by -30.3 % for Portuguese women and by -22.3 % for Portuguese men, leading to a gender gap of 8.0 p.p.
As regards the third quarter (comparing Q3 2020 with Q3 2019), Member States with the largest gender gaps were Luxembourg (6.0 p.p), Malta (5.7 p.p.) and Croatia (5.6 p.p.). In Luxembourg, the volume of working hours for women increased by +4.3 % between Q3 2019 and Q3 2020, while the one for men decreased by -1.6 %. Malta followed a similar pattern with an increase of +0.9 % for women and a decrease of -4.9 % for men. By contrast, Croatian women saw their volume of working hours decreasing by -5.6 % while Croatian men saw their volume remaining unchanged between Q3 2019 and Q3 2020.
Malta was also the EU country with the largest gender gap in the fourth quarter (comparing Q4 2020 with Q4 2019). The volume of hours worked by men in Malta dropped by -11.1 % while for women the decrease was only -1.3 %, giving 9.8 p.p. as gender gap. Differences between men and women in terms of change in the volume of working hours were also important in Slovenia and Lithuania. The total working hours declined by -5.1 % for Slovenian women and rose by +1.4 % for Slovenian men (gender gap of 6.5 p.p.) while they declined by -7.1 % for Lithuanian women and by -2.7 % for Lithuanian men (gender gap of 4.4 p.p.).
At EU level, self-employed persons were most affected over the four quarters of 2020
This section focuses on the working hours by professional status, which is divided into four categories: employees, self-employed persons with employees (employers), self-employed persons without employees (own-account workers) and family workers. Comparing the volume of hours worked in Q1 2020 with the one in Q1 2019, a decrease can be observed for each of the four professional statuses, with the largest decreases for self-employed persons: -3.7 % for employees, -7.8 % for self-employed with employees, -7.9 % for self-employed without employees, and -5.1 % for family workers (see Figures 3 to 6).
The same pattern appeared in the second quarter (comparing Q2 2020 with Q2 2019), but nevertheless with larger falls: -13.8 % for employees, -21.4 % for self-employed with employees, -22.1 % for self-employed without employees, and -13.9 % for family workers.
In the third quarter (comparing Q3 2020 with Q3 2019), the situation changed with the smallest decreases, and with self-employed persons with employees and family workers being the most affected while employees and self-employed persons without employees were the least affected: -2.7 % for employees, -5.1 % for self-employed with employees, -2.6 % for self-employed without employees, and -4.9 % for family workers.
Finally, comparing Q4 2020 with Q4 2019, self-employed persons with or without employees appeared again as the most impacted in terms of working hours: -5.5 % for employees, -12.2 % for self-employed with employees, -7.5 % for self-employed without employees, and -6.0 % for family workers.
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
At country level, employees saw small increases in their volume of working hours in Slovenia (+1.2 %) and the Netherlands (+0.3 %) in the first quarter, in Slovakia (+1.4 %) , Czechia (+0.5 %), the Netherlands again (+0.2 %) and Finland (+0.1 %) in the third quarter, and Luxembourg (+1.8 %) and Slovenia (+1.0 %) in the fourth quarter. By contrast, employees from all other EU Member States and for other quarters experienced a decrease in their volume of hours of work. The sharpest falls in the working hours volume for employees were registered in Slovakia (-8.8 %), Italy (-8.2 %) and Croatia (-7.5 %) in the first quarter, Spain (-25.1 %), Greece (-24.5 %), Portugal (-24.3 %) and Cyprus (-20.6 %) in the second quarter, Spain (-7.7 %) and Portugal (-6.6 %) both again in the third quarter, and Austria (-11.5 %), Czechia (-10.7 %), Greece (-9.2 %) and Slovakia both for the second time (-8.9 %) in the fourth quarter.
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
Self-employed persons with employees recorded sharper decreases than employees in their total hours of work in most EU countries. In the first quarter, the highest drops appeared in Slovenia (-21.3 %), Estonia (-18.8 %) and Czechia (-15.7 %). However, some increases were observed in four Member States: Romania (+7.4 %), Finland (+3.2 %), the Netherlands (+2.5 %) and Latvia (+0.9 %).
In the second quarter, unprecedented falls were seen in Malta (-41.4 %), Ireland (-38.0 %), Cyprus (-37.3 %), Spain (-36.7 %), Slovenia (-35.4 %) and Portugal (-35.2 %). Latvia was the only EU country with a rise (+11.0 %) in that quarter.
As regards the third quarter, the decreases were the least, but still with -22.3 % in Lithuania, -15.6 % in Sweden, -15.5 % in Ireland and -11.6 % in Portugal. Nine Member States showed an increase in the working time for their self-employed persons with employees between Q3 2019 and Q3 2020.
For the fourth quarter, Cyprus showed the largest drop (-27.1 %), followed by Lithuania (-25.8 %), Austria (-21.7 %) and Czechia (-21.5 %). By contrast, self-employed persons with employees in Estonia (+10.8 %), Croatia (+7.1 %) and Bulgaria (+3.0 %) experienced an increase in their total working hours.
Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
The pattern by country for the self-employed persons without employees is slightly different. Six EU Member States displayed a rise in the first quarter: Hungary (+14.7 %), Luxembourg (+8.6 %), Bulgaria (+5.7 %), Latvia (+2.6 %), Cyprus (+2.4 %) and Malta (+1.8 %). All other EU countries saw a decrease in that quarter, with the main ones in Slovenia (-16.8 %), Italy (-15.4 %), Lithuania (-13.3 %) and Portugal (-12.6 %).
Interestingly, Cyprus (with an increase in the first quarter) recorded the sharpest decrease in the second quarter (-39.7 %), followed by Ireland (-35.6 %), Spain (-33.7 %), Portugal (-33.6 %), Malta (-32.4 %) and Italy (-32.3 %). In that quarter, only Latvia (+8.4 %) and Hungary (+3.9 %) showed a rise in their total working time for self-employed persons without employees.
In the third quarter, 11 Member States saw an increase while the largest decreases were found in Slovenia (-15.3 %), Ireland (-12.9 %), Estonia (-11.7 %), Latvia (-11.1 %) and Portugal (-10.8 %).
Finally, the fourth quarter was characterised by an increase in four EU countries and highest falls in Slovenia (-22.3 %), Estonia (-18.5 %) and Czechia (-15.7 %).
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
The most striking changes by professional status at country level were registered for contributing family workers (see Figure 6). However, it should be noted that in several countries the subpopulation of family workers is small and can consequently lead to results with low reliability.
Managers, service and sales workers and workers in elementary occupations were the most impacted in the fourth quarter
In this last section, focus is put on occupations. Results for all the following categories are shown in the Excel file (see here): managers; professionals; technicians and associate professionals; clerical support workers; and service and sales workers, skilled agricultural, forestry and fishery workers; craft and related trades workers; plant and machine operators and assemblers; elementary occupations; and armed forces occupations. Nevertheless, only major results will be presented below. These concern the managers, the service and sales workers and those working in the elementary occupations (those who are involved in simple and routine tasks which may require the use of hand-held tools and considerable physical effort, such as cleaners, agricultural workers and those employed in mining, construction and transport).
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
At EU level, the volume of hours worked by managers decreased in all quarters of 2020 compared to the corresponding quarter of 2019: -7.3 % from Q1 2019 to Q1 2020, -15.7 % from Q2 2019 to Q2 2020, -7.1 % from Q3 2019 to Q3 2020 and -9.6 % from Q4 2019 to Q4 2020. However, different patterns can be observed across countries. Italy and Portugal recorded important drops in all four quarters, with a sharp fall in the second one (Italy: -16.4 % in Q1, -31.6 % in Q2, -5.1 % in Q3, -14.4 % in Q4; Portugal: -9.6 % in Q1, -28.4 % in Q2, -13.7 % in Q3, -6.6 % in Q4). On the other hand, Denmark saw an increase in the first quarter (+6.6 %) but faced the largest decrease in the third quarter (-22.5 %). Luxembourgish managers also stood out but with the largest decrease in the first quarter (-22.2 %) and an important rise in the second quarter (+10.9 %).
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
The service and sales workers faced even larger decreases than managers in their hours of work in 2020 compared with 2019: at EU level -8.5 % in Q1, -28.7 % in Q2, -7.7 % in Q3 and -16.2 % in Q4. The sharpest falls were recorded for the second quarter in Spain (-44.6 %), Cyprus (-44.2 %) and Ireland (-41.8 %). These three Member States saw decreases for the four quarters. By contrast, Luxembourg (+7.8 %) and Romania (+2.1 %) reported an increase in the first quarter. Also, Denmark (+0.5 %) and Estonia (+1.5 %) benefited from a rise in the third quarter. With the exception of these four countries, all EU Member States saw decreases in the volume of working hours of their service and sales workers in the four quarters of 2020.
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Source: Eurostat (lfsq_ewhais)
Looking at the volume of hours worked in elementary occupations at EU level, decreases similar to those for service and sales workers were seen between 2019 and 2020: -6.9 % for Q1, -25.3 % for Q2, -8.4 % for Q3 and -11.0 % for Q4. Portuguese workers in elementary occupations experienced major drops in the second, third and fourth quarters (-6.5 % in Q1, -42.5 % in Q2, -29.6 % in Q3, -23.2 % in Q4). On the other hand, Slovenian workers in these occupations saw some increases in the third and fourth quarters (-13.8 % in Q1, -18.2 % in Q2, +3.3 % in Q3, +2.8 % in Q4). While having experienced a major rise in their volume of working hours in the first quarter, workers in elementary occupations in Cyprus experienced major decreases in the following quarters (+15.3 % in Q1, -23.9 % in Q2, -10.0 % in Q3, -16.6 % in Q4). Finally, workers with elementary occupations saw their volume of hours of work increasing between Q4 2019 and Q4 2020 in all EU Member States, except in Slovenia.
Source data for tables and graphs
Data sources
All figures in this article are based on detailed quarterly survey results from the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS).
Source: The European Union labour force survey (EU-LFS) is the largest European household sample survey providing quarterly and annual results on labour participation of people aged 15 and over as well as on persons outside the labour force. It covers residents in private households. Conscripts in military or community service are not included in the results. The EU-LFS is based on the same target populations and uses the same definitions in all countries, which means that the results are comparable between countries.
European aggregates: EU refers to the sum of EU-27 Member States.
Country note: In Germany, from the first quarter of 2020 onwards, the Labour Force Survey (LFS) has been integrated into the newly designed German microcensus as a subsample. Unfortunately, for the LFS, technical issues and the COVID-19 crisis has had a large impact on the data collection processes, resulting in low response rates and a biased sample. For this reason, the full sample of the whole microcensus has been used to estimate a restricted set of indicators for the four quarters of 2020 for the production of LFS Main Indicators. These estimates have been used for the publication of German results, but also for the calculation of EU and EA aggregates. By contrast, EU and EA aggregates published in the Detailed quarterly results (showing more and different breakdowns than the LFS Main Indicators) have been computed using only available data from the LFS subsample. As a consequence, small differences in the EU and EA aggregates in tables from both collections may be observed. For more information, see here.
Definitions: The concepts and definitions used in the labour force survey follow the guidelines of the International Labour Organisation.
Five different articles on detailed technical and methodological information are linked from the overview page of the online publication EU Labour Force Survey.
Context
The COVID-19 pandemic hit Europe in January and February 2020, with the first cases confirmed in Spain, France and Italy. COVID-19 infections have since been diagnosed in all European Union (EU) Member States. To fight the pandemic, EU Member States have taken a wide variety of measures. From the second week of March, most countries closed retail shops, with the exception of supermarkets, pharmacies and banks. Bars, restaurants and hotels were also closed. In Italy and Spain, non-essential production was stopped and several countries imposed regional or even national lock-down measures which further stifled economic activities in many areas. In addition, schools were closed, public events were cancelled and private gatherings (with numbers of persons varying from 2 to over 50) were banned in most EU Member States.
The large majority of preventative measures were taken during mid-March 2020, and most of the measures and restrictions were kept for the whole of April and May 2020. The first quarter of 2020 was consequently the first quarter in which the labour market across the EU was affected by the COVID-19 measures taken by Member States.
Employment and unemployment as defined by the ILO concept are, in this particular situation, not sufficient to describe the developments taking place in the labour market. In the first phase of the crisis, active measures to contain employment losses led to absences from work rather than dismissals, and individuals could not look for work or were not available due to the containment measures, thus not counting as unemployed.
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