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ST/ESA/STAT/SER.K/WWW/16/Rev.5
22 April 2005

The World's Women reports

 
Table 5b - Part-time employment

Country

Year

Percentage of adult employment that is part-time

Women's share of part-time employment

Notes

 

 

W

M

 

 

America, North

 

 

 

 

 

Bahamas

1999

14.8

12.0

53

 

Barbados

1999

18.3

10.8

63

 

Belize

1999

25.6

12.0

49

(1)

Canada

2002

27.7

10.9

69

(1)

Dominican Republic

2000

15.2

7.9

50

(2)

Jamaica

2001

15.8

10.2

52

 

Mexico

2002

25.6

7.1

66

(1)

Panama

2001

13.1

11.7

36

(2) (3)

Trinidad and Tobago

2001

9.7

6.2

48

 

United States of America

2002

17.1

6.9

68

(4) (5)

Asia

 

 

 

 

 

Japan

2002

40.2

13.7

67

(4)

Republic of Korea

2002

10.5

5.3

58

(4) (6)

Turkey

2002

13.1

3.7

58

(4)

Europe

 

 

 

 

 

Austria

2001

24.4

2.6

88

(1)

Belgium

2002

32.2

5.9

80

(1) (7)

Czech Republic

2002

4.9

1.4

73

(1)

Denmark

2002

22.9

10.3

66

(1) (7)

Finland

2002

14.7

7.5

65

(1)

France

2002

24.1

5.1

80

(1) (7)

Germany

2002

35.2

5.5

84

(1) (7)

Greece

2002

10.0

2.9

68

(1) (7)

Hungary

2002

4.0

1.4

70

(1)

Iceland

2002

31.2

10.2

73

(4)

Ireland

2002

33.2

7.1

77

(1) (7)

Italy

2002

23.4

4.8

74

(1) (7)

Luxembourg

2002

28.1

2.3

89

(1) (7)

Netherlands

2002

59.9

15.0

75

(1) (7)

Norway

2002

33.0

9.2

76

(4)

Poland

2002

16.7

7.5

65

(4)

Portugal

2002

14.4

5.7

68

(1) (7)

Slovakia

2002

2.3

1.0

66

(1) (8)

Spain

2002

16.3

2.4

80

(1) (7)

Sweden

2002

20.3

7.3

72

(1)

Switzerland

2002

45.3

7.7

83

(1)

United Kingdom

2002

39.7

8.8

79

(1) (7)

Oceania

 

 

 

 

 

Australia

2002

39.2

15.6

67

(4)

New Zealand

2002

35.7

11.3

73

(4)

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Sources
 
International Labour Office (ILO), Updated Key Indicators of the Labour Market (KILM) provided to UNSD in November 2004, supplemented by ILO, The Caribbean Labour Statistics Dataset, http://www.ilocarib.org.tt/system_links/link_databases.html accessed on 15 February 2005.
 
Footnotes
 

(1)

Coverage limited to hours worked on the main job.

(2)

Coverage limited to hours worked on the primary and secondary jobs.

(3)

Excluding areas of a predominantly indigenous population.

(4)

Based on hours worked on all jobs.

(5)

Wage and salaried workers only.

(6)

Excluding contributing family workers working less than 18 hours per week

(7)

Excluding travel time between home and work as well as main meal breaks. Estimates based on the European Labour Force Survey.

(8)

Excluding persons working less than four weeks in the reference period

 
Technical notes
 

This table presents statistics on part-time workers---i.e. persons with jobs whose working hours total less than "full time" (see definition below). The measures presented are total part-time employment as a percentage of total employment, calculated separately for women and for men, and the proportion of women among all part-time workers. All but two countries derived this information from labour force surveys; the remaining two obtained their information from population censuses.

There is no internationally accepted standard for the minimum number of hours worked per week that would constitute full-time work. The framework is therefore established on a country-by-country basis or in special regional compilations. Many countries have established demarcation points that lie between 30 and 40 hours per week. Other countries classify part-time and full-time workers on the basis of respondents' interpretations of their personal work situations---i.e. whether they view themselves as full-time or as part-time jobholders. In an attempt to make statistics on part-time work comparable across countries, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) applied a 30-hour cut-off for distinguishing part-time from full-time workers. Thus, in the OECD data set, one of the main sources of the KILM database, persons who work 30 hours or more per week are considered "full-time workers" and those who work less than 30 hours per week are considered "part-time workers".

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United Nations Statistics Division - Demographic and Social Statistics