Job vacancies in the labour market

Purpose and short description The quarterly vacancy survey meets the statistical needs of the European Commission as defined in Regulation (EC) No 453/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 April 2008, Commission Regulation (EC) No 1062/2008 of 28 October 2008 and Commission Regulation (EC) No 19/2009 of 13 January 2009. The statistics on job vacancies provide information on unmet labour demand. Job vacancies data are used to analyse the business cycle and labour market mismatches. The quarterly survey shall be based on a sample of enterprises with at least one employee. The data are collected by economic sector, region (establishment) and size class. Population The population examined consists of enterprises with at least one employee. The activities of households, self-employed and extraterritorial organisations and bodies (embassies, consulates, European institutions, WCO, NATO, etc.) are not eligible. Since 2014, all enterprises in NACE Rev. 2 Sections B to S have been analysed. Main definitions A “job vacancy” is a paid job either newly created, unoccupied or soon to be released, with the employer actually taking steps and willing to take more steps to find a suitable candidate outside the undertaking concerned, and intends to fill it in immediately or within a certain period of time. A job which is only open to internal candidates shall not be regarded as a vacancy. An ‘occupied job’ is understood as a paid job within an organisation for which an employee is employed. The vacancy rate represents the percentage of vacancies (as defined above) in relation to the total number of jobs. The vacancy rate is calculated as follows: Method for data collection and sample size The sampling method is based on a rotating sample drawn according to the size and economic sector of the companies/employers on the basis of their individual and quarterly declarations of the occupied jobs at the National Social Security Office (RSZ). The selected companies in the sample are surveyed on a quarterly basis. After one year, one third of the undertakings belonging to the strata with a draw probability shall be renewed below one third. For the other strata, the companies were included in the sample each year. On the basis of this sampling plan, developments in the business landscape can be taken into account, while coherence over the quarters is ensured. The questionnaires will be sent in XBRL format after the companies have been informed of their selection by means of a letter. In the survey form, companies are asked about the number of jobs occupied and vacancies (permanent or temporary) in the three regions of the country. The reference date corresponds to the middle of the quarter (15 February for the first quarter, 15 May for the second quarter, 16 August for the third quarter and 16 November for the fourth quarter). The average number of enterprises surveyed per quarter is 10,383 in 2012, 11,561 in 2013, 10 976 in 2014, 10 978 in 2015, 11.270 in 2016, 11,070 in 2017, 10.193 in 2018 and 10,241 in 2019. Response The response rate is on average 72 % in 2012, 67.5 % in 2013, 67 % in 2014, 65.8 % in 2015, 59.1 % in 2016, 64.5 % in 2017 and 60.8 % in 2018. Frequency The vacancy survey is conducted quarterly. Timing publication The results have been published 70 days after the reference period. Questionnaires Questionnaire (PDF, 17.58 Kb) Metadata Vacatures.pdf Vacancy survey.pdf