The Earnings, Hours and Employment Costs Survey (EHECS) is the official source of short term statistics on earnings and data is presented relating to average earnings in different economic sectors. The latest published data is for the first quarter of 2010 and this data is presented in table 1 below. It can be noted that EHECS does not collect information on the educational level of employees.
Information of that nature is collected through the National Employment Survey (NES) which attempts to highlight differences in earnings levels according to different characteristics of employees. The latest published data from the NES is for 2007. Table 2 below shows the average earnings of persons at different levels of completed education as of 2007 distinguished by gender and public/private sector.
Table 1: Average weekly and average hourly earnings by sector, Quarter 1 2010 (EHECS)
NACE Economic Sector
|
Average Earnings per Week
|
Average Hourly earnings
|
|
€
|
€
|
Industry (B to E)
|
800.16
|
22.13
|
Construction (F)
|
726.88
|
20.46
|
Wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles (G)
|
483.59
|
16.47
|
Transportation and storage (H)
|
680.15
|
19.21
|
Accommodation and food service activities (I)
|
316.91
|
12.67
|
Information and communication (J)
|
905.96
|
25.70
|
Financial, insurance and real estate activities (K, L)
|
1,013.59
|
30.53
|
Professional, scientific and technical activities (M)
|
856.30
|
26.50
|
Administrative and support service activities (N)
|
490.55
|
16.53
|
Public administration and defence; compulsory social security (O)
|
925.32
|
26.58
|
Education (P)
|
809.24
|
33.96
|
Human health and social work activities (Q)
|
699.06
|
24.02
|
Arts, entertainment, recreation and other service activities (R, S)
|
451.51
|
15.98
|
All NACE economic sectors
|
682.91
|
22.10
|
Private Sector
|
614.02
|
19.80
|
Public Sector
|
882.24
|
28.87
|
*Preliminary Estimates.
Table 2: Average hourly earnings by educational attainment, private/public sector status1 and sex, October 2007
Level of educational attainment
|
Private sector
|
Public sector1
|
Total
|
|
Male
|
Female
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
Total
|
Male
|
Female
|
Total
|
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
€
|
Primary or lower secondary
|
16.71
|
12.64
|
15.17
|
20.29
|
18.28
|
19.30
|
17.26
|
13.90
|
15.92
|
Higher secondary
|
17.48
|
14.54
|
16.14
|
22.65
|
19.68
|
20.95
|
18.16
|
15.70
|
16.97
|
Post leaving certificate
|
19.16
|
14.49
|
17.65
|
24.04
|
19.17
|
21.38
|
19.71
|
15.62
|
18.25
|
Third level non degree
|
21.53
|
17.27
|
19.10
|
27.59
|
22.49
|
23.91
|
22.62
|
18.84
|
20.32
|
Third level degree or higher
|
27.82
|
20.82
|
24.41
|
39.22
|
33.26
|
35.11
|
30.86
|
26.54
|
28.42
|
Total
|
19.77
|
15.94
|
18.07
|
28.17
|
25.79
|
26.67
|
21.17
|
18.91
|
20.08
|
1Public Sector including semi-state companies. See background notes for further information.