Analytics, Employment, Latvia, Statistics

International Internet Magazine. Baltic States news & analytics Saturday, 20.04.2024, 08:05

In the 1st quarter of 2020, 64.7% of the population of Latvia were employed

Sandra Ceriņa Social Statistics Data Compilation and Analysis Section, 22.05.2020.Print version
Results of the Labour Force Survey conducted by the Central Statistical Bureau (CSB) show that 902.1 thousand people or 64.7 % of the population of Latvia aged 15–74 were employed in the 1st quarter of 2020. During a year employment rate grew by 0.3 percentage points, however, emergency situation that was declared in the country on March 13 due to spread of Covid-19 has negatively affected labour market. The number of employed has reduced by 1.5 thousand during a year.

As compared to the previous quarter, employment rate fell by 0.7 percentage points (that is the largest drop in quarters since 2010), but the number of employed – by 11.0 thousand. The largest fall in the number of employed was in construction sector.

The largest reduction in the number of employees during the last seven years was registered – in the 1st quarter 22.6 thousand less employees were registered than in the previous quarter.

Nevertheless since the 3rd quarter of 2012 Latvian employment rate exceeds the European Union (EU) average1 (in the 4th quarter of 2019 it constituted 60.2%), in the 1st quarter it was the lowest among the Baltic states – employment rate in Estonia constituted 68.1% and in Lithuania 65.8%.



In the 1st quarter of 2020, employment rate among young people (aged 15–24) constituted 31.2 %, which is 1.2 percentage points lower indicator than that recorded in the previous period. The number of employed young people accounted for 53.3 thousand.

In the 1st quarter, persons in main job worked on average 37.3 hours per week – 0.4 hours fewer than in the same period of the previous year and 0.5 hours less than in the 4th quarter of 2019.


In the 1st quarter of 2020 share of part-time work increased – 12.0% or 108.0 thousand employed worked part-time, which is 27.9 thousand or 34.8% more than a year ago and 22.4 thousand or 26.2% more than in the previous quarter. Almost one fourth (24.2%) of employed indicated that they worked part-time due to economic reasons. In the 1st quarter of 2019 this reason was indicated by 19.2% of employed.


During a year the share of employees receiving EUR 700–1400 grew by 2.5 percentage points (28.9% in the 1st  quarter), whereas share of employees receiving more than EUR 1400 rose by 1.9 percentage points (6.3% in the 1st quarter). Share of employees receiving EUR 450–700 monthly after taxes fell by 1.1 percentage point (33.7% in the 1st quarter). The share of employees receiving less than EUR 450 monthly (after taxes) reduced to 25.4% (decrease of 3.6 percentage points). The proportion of employees receiving minimum monthly wage2 or less accounted for 14.9% or 117.1 thousand people (a reduction of 0.4 percentage points over the 1st quarter of 2019). In contrast to the previous quarters, when the highest share of people receiving lowest wages was still recorded in Latgale, in the 1st quarter of 2020 it was in Vidzeme, where 22.9% of the employees received minimum wage or less (in Latgale the share was slightly lower – 22.4%).


Employees by monthly net wages and salaries in the main job

(as per cent)

 

1st quarter of 2019

4th quarter of 2019

1st quarter of 2020

Employees

100.0

100.0

100.0

up to EUR 450.00

29.0

23.7

25.4

employees receiving minimum monthly wage or less

15.3

14.3

14.9

EUR 450.01–700.00

34.8

35.3

33.7

EUR 700.01-1400.00

26.4

31.1

28.9

EUR 1400.01 and more

4.4

5.5

6.3

was not calculated or paid

2.8

2.6

3.3

not specified

2.6

1.8

2.4


In the 1st quarter of 2020, wage or salary of 3.3% of employees was not calculated or paid, while 2.4 % did not indicate the size of earnings thereof.





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