Employees
16. Jun 2020
Employee numbers still far from pre-corona figures
Employees and COVID-19 stimulus payments
A person is regarded as an employee if he or she receives a wage payment which is no lower than a day wage for an unskilled worker. This means that persons receiving a combination of wage payments from an employer and COVID-19 stimulus payments are also regarded as employees. Persons who only receive COVID-19 stimulus payments are not regarded as employees in these figures.
The graph below shows a projection of how March, April and May would turn out assuming the employee trend remained unchanged. The red dots show the projected estimate (the point estimate) for these three months, while the blue dots show the real figures from March to May. The difference between the red and blue dots thus give an indication of how COVID-19 has affected employee numbers. The grey field shows the degree of uncertainty (80% and 95%).
The real number of employees in May was 25,700. The projected estimate was just over 27,400 – a difference of about 1,700 (6%).
Private service sector saw the biggest drop
The four graphs below show the employee figures in the four main industrial sectors: ‘the public service sector’, ‘the private service sector’, ‘fishing and other natural resources’ and ‘construction and other manufacturing’ over the past two years.
As in the graph above, the blue line shows the general employee numbers, the blue dots show the employee numbers in March, April and May 2020. The red dots show the projected estimate assuming the employee trend remained unchanged. The grey field shows the degree of uncertainty (80% and 95%).
A comparison between the real and the projected figures for March, April and May shows that the private service sector deviates the most from the projected estimate and had the biggest drop in employee numbers.
The private service sector had some 8,000 employees in May. The projected estimate showed about 8,900 – a difference of 900 employees (10%). In April, this difference was 14%, which means the situation in this sector has improved slightly compared to April.
The figures for the other three main industrial sectors are more consistent with the projected estimate.
Private service sector subdivided into branches
The private service sector branches with the biggest drop in employee numbers are ‘hotels and restaurants’, ‘trade and repair’, ‘other transport’ and ‘household services’. The four graphs below show the trends in these branches.
Employee figures in the ‘hotels and restaurants’ branch went down by half in April, but the number has increased slightly in May
After a big decline in April, employee figures in ‘trade and repair’ and ‘household services’ (including hairdressers, beauty salons, fitness centres, cleaning services and rubbish collection services) are now almost back in line with the projected estimates.
In the ‘other transport’ branch (including air transport, freight transport, public transport, taxis and other forms of passenger transport), the situation in May remains largely unchanged compared to April
About employees
An employee is anyone aged between 16 and 74 who earns a wage that is subject to tax at source (PAYE) and resides in the Faroe Islands at the time of wage payment. A person is regarded as an employee if he or she receives a wage payment which is no lower than a day wage for an unskilled worker, regardless of whether the wage is paid by a Faroese or an overseas company.
About the trend
The trend describes the employee trend by adjusting for seasonal effects and error components in the figures.
About the main industrial sectors
Grouped under the ‘fishery and other natural resources’ sector are the following branches: agriculture, fishing, aquaculture, extraction of raw materials, fish processing and activities not elsewhere indicated.
The ‘construction and other manufacturing’ sector includes: shipyards/machine shops, other manufacturing, construction and energy.
The ‘private services’ sector includes: trade and repair, hotels and restaurants, sea transport, other transport, communications, finance and insurance, business services. household services and organisations, culture, etc.
‘Governmental and other services’ includes: public administration and services (central administration, municipalities, education, health and social work), government institutions and the Ministries of Education and Health.