Wage statistics. Employees in Information sector
06.05. Wage and labour costs
Frequency: Annual per third quarter each year
Timeliness: Publication in May the year after
National level.
Income and Wage Statistics.
Statistics Act Sections 2-1, 2-2 and 2-3 .
Council Regulation (EC) no. 530/1999 of 9 March 1999 Concerning Structural Statistics for Wages and Labour Costs.
The statistic is part of the Eurostat reporting every fourth year
The purpose of the statistic is to provide an overview of wage levels and wage changes for employees in the information sector. The statistic with its present size was established in 2006 and give figures back to 2004. Numbers for the ICT sector were given separately in the period 1999-2003.
Major users are the Technical Reporting Committee on the Income Settlement, research and policy institutes, employee and employer organizations, Eurostat, the media, business and industry and individuals.
The population covers all enterprises in Statistics Norway’s Central Register of Establishments and Enterprises in chosen parts of manufacturing, wholesale and retail trade, transport and communication and real estate, business activities in the Standard Industrial Classification. Due to changes in the definition of the ICT-trade , the figures are not comparable between 2002 and 2003 (see http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/10/03/iktoms_en/). The content sector was included in the statistic from 2004.
Each enterprise covers one or more establishments grouped by industrial category. The wage statistics data are obtained for each establishment at the person level.
The figures for the information sector are based on the wage statistics from manufacturing, wholesale and retail trade, transport and communication, real estate and business activities and social and personal service activities.
The sample consists of employees from the divisions mentioned in 3.2. See also 3.1.
None. The figures for the information sector are based on the existing wage statistics (se 3.2).
The numerical data collected from the sample shall represent the average wage level in the industry. The figures from the sample must therefore be weighted. Weighting in the statistics is based on the inverse inclusion probability and post-stratification with regard to industry and employment at the date of the census. In order to give an average level for wages across all industries a re-weighting of the data from the original wage surveys is carried out. From each year National Accounts for third quarter, preliminary figures of the number of employees are utilized to construct a level between the different industries. Thus the final weight considers both the weights from the wage surveys of the respective industries and each industry's level of employees as in the National Accounts.
According to Statistics Act Section 2-6, figures shall not be published in such a way that they may be traced to a particular respondent.
In the statistics, wages and salaries refer only to cash payments from employer to employee for work rendered. The statistics hence do not include payment in kind, insurance or non-taxable expense allowances and the like.
Monthly earnings are the main term in Statistics Norway’s wage statistics. Monthly earnings cover basic salaries, variable additional allowances and bonuses. Overtime pay is not included in monthly earnings.
Basic salaries are the actual payment at the time of the census and are often described as salary by scale or regular basic wage. Qualification/skill allowance and other regular personal allowances are included in this type of wage. The wage or salary may be payment by the hour, week, fortnight or month.
As a rule, variable additional allowances are associated with special duties or working hours and the figures given are a calculated average per month for the period 1 January to the time of the census. Variable additional allowances cover allowances for working evenings and nights, call-out allowance, shift allowance, dirty conditions allowance, offshore allowance and other allowances that occur irregularly.
This item includes allowances that are usually not connected with specific duties and where the payments occur irregularly with respect to the period in which they are earned or to which they apply. Other examples of types of payments under this item are profit sharing, production allowance and gratuities. The figures given for bonuses are a calculated average per month for the period 1 October of the previous year to the time of the census. Information about the 4th quarter of the previous year is included in order to get information for an entire year. This is done because the types of payments covered here are often paid out at irregular intervals and because the earning period is not necessarily the same as the period in which the payment was made.
Payment for overtime work covers the sum of cash compensation for work done beyond contractual working hours, which is then compensated with a supplement to the basic wage or salary. Overtime compensation is a calculated average per month over the period 1 January to the time of the census. This type of payment is not included in monthly earnings, but figures are given for overtime compensation when the statistics are released.
Overtime hours cover only the hours for which remuneration is paid, not hours taken off in lieu of unpaid overtime. In some industries it is not unusual for overtime hours to be compensated with both pay and time off. In such cases, all the hours and the cash benefit are reported under payment for overtime work.
Contractual working hours is defined as the contractual number of working hours per week, excluding meal breaks. No deductions are made for absences due to holiday, illness, leave of absence or the like. For employees with working hours that varies from one week to another, the average number of hours per week is reported for the year or for the last month.
Information is collected on all employees regardless of contractual working hours. Employees with a contractual 33 hours or more per week are regarded as full-time employees.
Employees with a contractual working time of less than 33 hours per week are regarded as part-time employees.
The national identity number indicates age and sex.
A key component of the wage statistics is classification by industry in accordance with the Standard Industrial Classification (SN 2002), which is the Norwegian version of the international Standard Industrial Classification (SIC94).
For more information about the Standard Industrial Classification:
http://www3.ssb.no/stabas/ItemsFrames.asp?ID=3152101&Language=nb
http://www.ssb.no/emner/10/01/nace/
For more information about the definition of the Information sector
The Standard Classification of Occupation (C521), which is the Norwegian version of the International Standard Classification of Occupation (ISCO-88), is used in the statistics. This set of occupation codes is established throughout the wage statistics, either through direct input or by encoding from other occupation codes.
More information on the Standard Classification of Occupation is available at http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/06/01/nos_c521_en/
Education levels are obtained from the register of the Population’s Highest Level of Education (BHU). The classification is by the length of education according to the Standard for Educational Classification.
More information about the Standard Education Classification can be found at http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/04/90/
The figures for 2005 are based on new definitions for what is required to obtain the different levels of education in Norway. The figures for wages by education are therefore not comparable from 2004 and earlier years. More information on http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/04/01/utniv_en/.
Sources of errors in wage statistics are mainly errors in registers that are used for stratification and in sample selection, incorrect reporting of wage types, working hours or other variables asked for, errors in scanning or recording reported data or incorrect and incomplete information from other sources.
The increasing use of electronic reporting of wage statistics in recent years has helped to reduce the number of errors in the reported data.
Measurement errors can mainly occur because the respondent misunderstands what is included in and consequently reported in each column on the form or because it is very difficult for the respondent to find the information requested. All variables collected and that, directly or indirectly, are included in released statistics are checked, either in logical controls or by absolute limits for what is considered valid. If important data are missing in the received reports, the data are obtained either by returning the form, by a phone call to the respondent or by imputation.
The data that are received are registered either by optical scanning, manual recording or loading files structured according to the electronic requirement specification. Several controls are carried out on the material.
Non-response in the wage statistics is between 2.5 and 5 per cent. The main reasons for non-response are that enterprises no longer have employees because the business has been closed, sold or taken over by new owners, has gone bankrupt or has been merged in the time period between the selection of the sample and the time of the census. There is furthermore a small group that report too late to make it into the statistics.
Non-responses that are not randomly distributed can make the sample biased. Post-stratification adjusts any imbalances arising in the distribution between the stratification variables due to non-response. In the statistics, the stratification is by industry and size (number of employees) of the enterprises, on the assumption that wages in large enterprises differ from those in small ones, and that there are differences according to industry.
Non-response in several of the items collected by form and used in the wage statistics can normally be logically calculated on the basis of other information given on the form or imputed from earlier years.
Sampling errors are errors that may arise in areas subject to sampling.
All sample-based surveys will be burdened with a certain uncertainty. Generally, the results are less certain the fewer the observations they are based on. Uncertainty also depends on wage dispersion and rate of coverage for the various variables in the population from which the sample is drawn. Groups that are based on relatively few observations will easily be affected by so-called extreme observations, or observations that deviate markedly from the group average. Such extreme observations are carefully considered on a case-by-case basis for inclusion in the statistical basis.
Sample bias may arise when the distribution on some variables in different parts of the sample is not the same as the corresponding distribution in the population. Dividing the population into groups (strata) according to certain stratification variables reduces the possibility of imbalances in the sample.
Incorrect industry codes and/or employment data in Statistics Norway’s Register of Establishments and Enterprises during the selection of the sample may result in the establishments being placed in the wrong industry or selection stratum.
These are error types that include possible errors in model assumptions in the statistics.
The statistics in the current form were produced for the first time in 2006, and are comparable from 2004. An overview of previous years’ statistics is found at http://www.ssb.no/lonnikt_en/
New annual wage statistics for most industrial sections were established in 1997. The wage statistics are to be uniform and comparable among the sections (http://www.ssb.no/english/subjects/06/05/).
The statistics are published electronically as Today’s Statistics on Statistics Norway’s website. The statistics are released at 10.00 on the day given in the statistics calendar. The statistics are also published in Statistical Yearbook, NOS Wage Statistics. and in StatBank.
Raw data files with wage data put through link programs are stored.