A.
Economically active population (paras.
2.165-2.200)
The economically active population
comprises all persons of either sex who provide or are available
to provide the supply of labour for the production of economic goods
and services, as defined by the System of National Accounts (SNA),
during a specified time reference period. Activities are within
the production boundary defined by the SNA1
if they comprise (a) production of goods or services supplied or
intended to be supplied for sale in the market; (b) own-account
production of all goods retained by their producers; and (c) own-account
production of housing services by owner-occupiers and of domestic
and personal services produced by paid domestic staff. Own-account
production of goods and services includes for example, production
of agricultural products and their subsequent storage; production
of other primary products such as mining of salt, cutting of peat,
supply of water; processing of agricultural products; and other
kinds of processing such as weaving of cloth, dressmaking and tailoring;
production of footwear, pottery, utensils or durables; making of
furniture or furnishings; and major renovations, extensions to dwellings,
replastering of walls or re-roofing by owners of owner-occupied
dwellings.2
Domestic or personal services provided
by unpaid household members for final consumption within the same
household are excluded from the production boundary and hence are
not considered to be economic activities. (Examples are (a) the
cleaning, decoration and maintenance of the dwelling occupied by
the household, including small repairs of a kind usually carried
out by tenants as well as owners; (b) the cleaning, servicing and
repair of household durables or other goods, including vehicles
used for household purposes; (c) the preparation and serving of
meals; (d) the care, training and instruction of children; (e) the
care of sick, infirm or old people; and (f) the transportation of
members of the household or their goods.)
The economically active population
can be measured in many different ways, and the 1982 recommendations
of ILO include, in particular, two useful ways of measuring the
economically active population. One approach uses the usually active
population, measured in relation to a long reference period such
as a year, and the other uses the currently active population or,
equivalently, the labour force, measured in relation to a short
reference period such as one week or one day.
The "current activity"
measure is the one used as the basis for international comparisons
of the economically active population, employment and unemployment.
A.1 Usually active population
The usually active population
comprises all persons above a specified age whose activity status,
as determined in terms of the total number of weeks or days during
a long specified period (such as the preceding 12 months or the
preceding calendar year) was either “employed” or “unemployed”,
as defined below.
A.2 Currently active population,
or labour force
The currently active population,
or the labour force, comprises all persons above a specified age,
whose activity status based on a brief reference period such as
one week was either employed or unemployed, as defined in the paragraphs
that follow.
A.2.i Employed population
The employed comprise
all persons above a specified age who, during a short reference
period of either one week or one day, were in one of the following
categories:
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(a) |
Paid employment: |
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(i) |
At work:
persons who during the reference period performed some work
for wage or salary, in cash or in kind; |
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(ii) |
With a job but not at
work: persons who, having already worked in their present
job, were temporarily not at work during the reference period
and had a formal attachment to their job as evidenced by,
for example, a continued receipt of wage/salary, an assurance
of return to work following the end of the contingency, an
agreement on the date of return following the short duration
of absence from the job, and so on; |
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(b) |
Self-employment: |
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(i) |
At work: persons
who during the reference period performed some work for profit
or family gain, in cash or in kind; |
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(ii) |
With an enterprise but
not at work: persons with an enterprise, which may be
a business enterprise, a farm or a service undertaking, who
were temporarily not at work during the reference period for
some specific reason. |
According to the present international
recommendations, the notion of some work should be interpreted as
work for at least one hour during the reference period.
A.2.i
Unemployed population
The unemployed comprise
all persons above a specified age who during the reference period
were:
(a) |
Without work, in
other words, not in paid employment or self-employment, as
defined above; |
(b) |
Currently available for work,
in other words, were available for paid employment or self-employment
during the reference period; |
(c) |
Seeking work, in other words,
took specific steps in a specified recent period to seek paid
employment or self-employment. The specific steps may have
included registration at a public or private employment exchange;
application to employers; checking at worksites, farms, factory
gates, markets or other places of assembly; placing or answering
newspaper advertisements; seeking assistance of friends and
relatives; looking for land, building, machinery or equipment
to establish one’s own enterprise; arranging for financial
resources; applying for permits and licences, and so forth.
It would be useful to distinguish first-time job-seekers from
other job-seekers in the classification of the unemployed. |
In general, to be classified as
unemployed, a person must satisfy all three of the above criteria.
However, in situations where the conventional means of seeking work
are of limited relevance, where the labour market is largely unorganized
or of limited scope, where labour absorption is, at the time, inadequate,
or where the labour force is largely self-employed, the standard
definition of unemployment may be applied by relaxing the criterion
of seeking work. Such a relaxation is aimed primarily at those developing
countries where the criterion does not capture the extent of unemployment
in its totality. With this relaxation of the criterion of seeking
work, which permits in extreme cases the criterion’s complete
suppression, the two basic criteria that remain applicable are “without
work” and “currently available for work”.
B. Population not economically
active (paras. 2.201-2.208)
The population not economically
active comprises all persons, irrespective of age, including
those below the age specified for measuring the economically active
population, other than those classified as economically active.
B.1 Population not usually
active
The population not usually
active comprises all persons not classified either as employed
or as unemployed. It includes the following four groups:
(a) |
Students: persons
of either sex, not classified as usually economically active,
who attended any regular educational institution, public or
private, for systematic instruction at any level of education; |
(b) |
Homemakers: persons of either
sex, not classified as usually economically active, who were
engaged in household duties in their own home, for example,
housewives and other relatives responsible for the care of
the home and children (domestic employees, working for pay,
however, are classified as economically active; |
(c) |
Pension or capital income recipients:
persons of either sex, not classified as usually economically
active, who receive income from property or investments, interests,
rents, royalties or pensions from former activities, and who
cannot be classified as students or homemakers; |
(d) |
Others: persons of either sex,
not classified as usually economically active, who are receiving
public aid or private support, and all other persons not falling
into any of the above categories. |
B.2 Population not currently active
(not in the labor force)
The population not currently active or,
equivalently, persons not in the labour force, comprises
all persons who were neither employed nor unemployed
during the short reference period used to measure current activity.
It includes
(a) |
persons in attendance
at educational institutions, |
(b) |
persons engaged in household
duties, |
(c) |
persons in retirement, old
age and so forth and |
(d) |
persons inactive for other
reasons, including disability. |
The term “attendence at an educational institution”
refers to attendance at any regular educational institution, public
or private, for systematic instruction at any level of education,
or temporary absence for relevant reasons corresponding to those
specified for persons temporarily not at work. The term “engaged
in household duties” refers to engagement in household duties
in one's own home. Domestic servants working for pay in somebody
else's home are to be classified as economically active.
C.
Time worked (paras. 2.209-2.211)
Time worked is the total time actually
spent producing goods and services, within regular working hours
and as overtime, during the reference period adopted for economic
activity in the census. If the reference period is short, for example,
the week preceding the census, time worked should be measured in
hours. If the reference period is long, for example, the 12 months
preceding the census, time worked should be measured in units of
weeks, or in days where feasible. Time worked also includes time
spent in activities that, while not leading directly to produced
goods or services, are still defined as part of the tasks and duties
of the job, such as preparing, repairing or maintaining the workplace
or work instruments. In practice, it will also include inactive
time spent in the course of performing these activities, such as
time spent waiting or standing by, and in other short breaks. Longer
meal breaks and time spent not working because of vacation, holidays,
sickness or conflicts (for example, strikes and lockouts) are excluded.
D. Occupation
(paras. 2.212-2.220)
Occupation refers to the type of work done
during the time-reference period by the person employed (or the
type of work done previously, if the person is unemployed), irrespective
of the industry or the status in employment in which the person
should be classified. For purposes of international comparisons,
countries classify occupations in accordance with the latest revision
available of the International
Standard Classification of Occupations (ISCO).
E.
Industry (paras.
2.221-2.225)
Industry refers to the activity
of the establishment in which an employed person worked during the
time-reference period established for data on economic characteristics
(or last worked, if unemployed). For purposes of international comparisons,
countries classify the industrial characteristics of active persons
according to the most recent revision of the
International Standard Industrial Classification of All Economic
Activities (ISIC).
F. Status in employment
(paras. 2.226-2.235)
Status in employment refers
to the status of an economically active person with respect to his
or her employment, that is to say, the type of explicit or implicit
contract of employment with other persons or organizations that
the person has in his/her job. The basic criteria used to define
the groups of the classification are the type of economic risk,
an element of which is the strength of the attachment between the
person and the job, and the type of authority over establishments
and other workers that the person has or will have in the job. Care
should be taken to ensure that an economically active person is
classified by status in employment on the basis of the same job(s)
as used for classifying the person by "occupation", "industry"
and "sector".
The International Classification
of Status in Employment (ICSC) classifies the economically active
population by status in employment as follows:
(a) |
Employees,
among whom it may be possible to distinguish between employees
with stable contracts (including regular employees) and other
employees; |
(b) |
Employers; |
(c) |
Own-account workers; |
(d) |
Contributing family
workers; |
(e) |
Members of producers'
co-operatives; |
(f) |
Persons not classifiable
by status. |
G. Income
(paras. 2.236-2.238)
In light of the conceptual
underpinning for the new international standards concerning the
economically active population, income may be defined in terms of
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(a) |
monthly
income in cash and/or in kind from the work performed by each
active person or |
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(b) |
the total annual income in cash
and/or in kind of households regardless of source. |
The income from employment of economically
active persons includes wages and salaries of employees, income
of members from producers' cooperatives and the entrepreneurial
income of employers and own-account workers operating business and
unincorporated enterprises. In addition to the income from employment
of its economically active members, the total income of the household
includes, for example, the interest, dividends, rent, social security
benefits, pensions and life insurance annuity benefits of all its
members.
H. Institutional sector
of employment (paras. 2.239-2.244)
The Institutional sector of employment
relates to the legal organization and principal functions, behaviour
and objectives of the enterprise with which a job is associated.
Following the definitions provided in the System of National Accounts
(SNA) the following institutional sectors may be distinguished:
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(a) |
Corporation, comprising non-financial and financial corporations
(in other words incorporated enterprises, private and public
companies, joint-stock companies, limited liability companies,
registered cooperatives, limited liability partnerships,
and so forth) and quasi-corporations, as well as non-profit
institutions, such as hospitals, schools and colleges, that
charge fees to cover their current production costs;
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(b) |
General government, comprising
central, state and local government units together with social
security funds imposed or controlled by those units, and non-profit
institutions engaged in non-market production controlled and
financed by government, or by social security funds; |
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(c) |
Non-profit institutions
serving households comprising units engaged in the production
of non-market goods and services for households and whose
main resources are from voluntary contributions; |
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(d) |
Households (including unincorporated
enterprises owned by households) comprising unincorporated
enterprises directly owned and controlled by members of private
and
institutional households (made up of persons staying in hospitals,
retirement homes, convents, prisons and so forth, for long
periods of time), either individually or in partnership with
others. Partners may be members of the same household or from
different households. |
I. Place of work (paras.
2.245-2.247)
Place of work is the location
in which a currently employed person performed his or her job, and
where a usually employed person performed the primary job used to
determine his/her other economic characteristics such as occupation,
industry, and status in employment.
Place of work may have the following
response categories, or a variation thereof necessitated by national
circumstances:
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(a) |
Work at home: in addition
to those whose economic activities are conducted from units
or offices within the home, this category includes farmers
who work and live on their farms, persons working and living
at work camps, and those engaged in own-account production
of goods; |
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(b) |
No fixed place of work:
this category should be restricted to persons whose work involves
travel in different areas and who do not report daily in person
to a fixed address, for example, itinerant traders or hawkers,
travelling salesmen and long-distance lorry drivers; |
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(c) |
With a fixed place of work outside the home: this category
includes the remaining employed population. Also included
in this group are persons who do not have a fixed place
of work but who report to a fixed address at the beginning
of their work period (for example, bus drivers, airline
pilots and stewards), and individuals who travel to work,
on a regular basis, across the border to a neighbouring
country.
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| Notes: |
1
Commission of the European Communities, International Monetary
Fund, Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development,
United Nations and World Bank, System of National Accounts
1993 (United Nations publication, Sales No. E.94.XVII.4),
para. 6.18.
2
Ibid., paras. 6.24 and 6.25. |
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