In 2021, average hourly labour costs per hour was estimated at 6,496 ISK1 in Iceland. The hourly labour costs ranged from 4,789 ISK, or 31.9 euros, in accommodation and food service activities to 9,096 ISK, or 60.6 euros, in financial and insurance activities.
In the European Union (EU), the average hourly labour costs were estimated at 29.1 euros in 2021 and 32.8 euros in the euro area.
Of the countries in Eurostat’s dataset, hourly labour costs were highest in Norway (51.1 euros), Denmark (47.4 euros) and Iceland (43.3 euros). The hourly labour costs were lower in the other Nordic countries, Sweden (39.7 euros) and Finland (35.1 euros). The lowest recorded labour costs were in Bulgaria (7 euros) and in Rumania (8.5 euros).
It should be noted that currency and price levels differ between countries, which can affect the comparison of labour cost levels in euros. Further statistics are in Eurostat’s news release from 28 March 2022.
About hourly labour cost
Hourly labour costs are based on the Labour Cost Survey (LCS). The intention is to give a comparable and timely indication on labour cost status in all economic activities in Europe as the survey is only conducted every four years. The LCS provides details on the level and structure of labour cost data, hours worked and hours paid for employees, both full-time and part-time in Europe. The survey covers employers with 10 or more employees.
Labour cost refers to the total expenditure of employers in order to employ staff and covers wage and non-wage costs. In Iceland, hours of work are produced with an ensemble of statistical estimation methods based among other things on surveys performed by Statistics Iceland, mainly the Icelandic Survey on Wages, Earnings and Labour Cost, and register data. Note that in some instances, for example among managers and professionals, fixed-wage contracts can be common. Thus, employees do not get paid overtime, and therefore their working hours might be underestimated. However, in other cases hours can be overestimated, e.g. when overtime hours are used instead of overpayments and the recorded hours are not worked.
The results are preliminary and are part of a development project at Statistics Iceland which is based on using various data sources, such as wages subject and pay-as-you-go tax collection according to register data.
1 Here in total, the economic activities of agriculture, forestry and fishing and public administration are excluded. The total hourly labour cost including public administration was 6,552 ISK in 2021.
Statistics on Eurostat’s website
Statistics on hourly labour cost in Iceland