Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 6 December 2022
185. Deputy Carol Nolan asked the Minister for Finance the average wage, the average industrial wage, and the average public sector wage for each year from 1997 to date; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [60755/22]
Amharc ar fhreagraAlthough earnings statistics have been produced in Ireland for many years, predominantly for the Industrial sector, the focus and means of collecting the data has evolved over time. However changes to methodologies mean that statistics produced are not available or directly comparable over the time horizon outlined in your enquiry.
For directly comparable statistics on recent developments in wages by sector, I have included data from the Earnings and Labour Costs (EHECS) survey from 2008 to 2022. The purpose of the EHECS survey is to provide timely and comparable quarterly and annual earnings and labour costs statistics across economic sectors in Ireland. However the data collected ‘’is not directly comparable with other discontinued short-term earnings surveys such as the Quarterly Industrial Inquiry (QII), the Quarterly Services Inquiry (QSI) and the Quarterly Earnings and Hours worked in Construction (QEC) releases.’’
The data from EHECS included below represents the average weekly earnings of all NACE economic sectors (average wage), the manufacturing sector (proxy for industrial wage) and the public sector. Some care should be taken when interpreting the data post-2019 as a result of compositional affects arising from the impact of the pandemic on the labour market. During the pandemic, measures were distorted as average wages increased mechanically due to the impact of containment measures in lower paid sectors and on lower paid workers. Therefore, developments over the pandemic years should be interpreted with caution.
Average Weekly Earnings in euros, nominal, CSO EHECS Survey*
|
- |
Average Wage |
Manufacturing Sector |
Public Sector |
|
2008 |
707 |
766 |
930 |
|
2009 |
708 |
771 |
952 |
|
2010 |
698 |
781 |
915 |
|
2011 |
689 |
780 |
905 |
|
2012 |
694 |
793 |
918 |
|
2013 |
691 |
795 |
915 |
|
2014 |
693 |
827 |
908 |
|
2015 |
701 |
829 |
912 |
|
2016 |
710 |
839 |
910 |
|
2017 |
724 |
849 |
934 |
|
2018 |
747 |
874 |
959 |
|
2019 |
775 |
889 |
976 |
|
2020 |
815 |
912 |
1004 |
|
2021 |
853 |
951 |
1036 |
|
2022* |
874 |
978 |
1042 |
*2022 represents an average of the three quarters of data available.
*The earnings data collected for the EHECS includes bonuses and other irregular earnings.
