Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/2240 of 16 December 2019 specifying the technical items of the data set, establishing the technical formats for transmission of information and specifying the detailed arrangements and content of the quality reports on the organisation of a sample survey in the labour force domain in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2019/1700 of the European Parliament and of the Council (Text with EEA relevance)

THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION,

Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

Having regard to Regulation (EU) 2019/1700 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 October 2019 establishing a common framework for European statistics relating to persons and households, based on data at individual level collected from samples, amending Regulations (EC) No 808/2004, (EC) No 452/2008 and (EC) No 1338/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council, and repealing Regulation (EC) No 1177/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council and Council Regulation (EC) No 577/98 (1), and in particular Articles 7(1), 8(3) and 13(6) thereof,

Whereas:

(1) In order to ensure the accurate implementation of the sample survey in the labour force domain, the Commission should specify the technical items of the data set, the technical formats for transmission of information and the detailed arrangements and content of the quality reports.

(2) The Member States and the Union institutions should use statistical classifications for the territorial units, education, occupation and economic sector that are compatible with the NUTS (2), ISCED (3), ISCO (4) and NACE (5) classifications.

(3) The measures provided for in this Regulation are in accordance with the opinion of the European Statistical System Committee,

HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:

Article 1

Subject matter

This Regulation specifies the technical items of the data set, the technical formats for the transmission of information from Member States to the Commission (Eurostat) and the detailed arrangements for transmission and the content of the quality reports in the labour force domain.

Article 2

Definitions

For the purposes of this Regulation, the following definitions apply:

(1) ‘main variable’ means a variable with a quarterly periodicity;

(2) ‘structural variable’ means an annual, biennial, eight-yearly variable or a variable collected on an ad hoc subject;

(3) ‘minimum set of variables’ means the variables to be collected for all household members to allow analyses both at household level and at individual level broken down by specific household characteristics;

(4) ‘sample rotation scheme’ means the split of the total sample into sub-samples of observation units similar in size and design, used to specify the number of times and the exact reference quarters of the year for which an observation unit shall provide information in the survey;

(5) ‘wave’ means the sub-sample of observation units due to be interviewed for the same nth time according to the sample rotation scheme in a reference quarter;

(6) ‘uniform sample distribution of the annual sample’ with regards to all the reference quarters of the year means that each quarterly sample is the total annual sample divided by four;

(7) ‘uniform sample distribution of the quarterly sample’ with regards to all the reference weeks of the quarter means that each weekly sample is the total quarterly sample divided by the number of the weeks of the quarter; the acceptable variation as specified in Article 6(2) and (3) applies to both distribution;

(8) ‘sample of independent observations’ means a sample where each observation unit occurs only once according to the sample design;

(9) ‘reliability limits’ mean estimated sizes of population groups below which figures have to be suppressed or published with warning;

Article 3

Description of variables

(a) the detailed topic on ‘work organisation and working time arrangements’, for which the number of variables shall not exceed 10 in a given year; and

(b) the detailed topics on ‘young people on the labour market’ and on ‘educational attainment — details, including education interrupted or abandoned’, for which the combined number of eight-yearly variables shall not exceed seven in a given year.

Article 4

Statistical populations, observation units and rules for respondents

(a) every person of whatever age on the topics ‘technical items’ and ‘person and household characteristics’;

(b) every person aged 15 to 74 on the ‘participation in education and training’ topic;

(c) every person aged 15 to 89 for quarterly, annual and biennial variables on all other topics;

(d) every person aged 15 to 74 for the eight-yearly variables of the detailed topics on ‘labour market situation of migrants and their immediate descendants’ and ‘accidents at work and other work-related health problems’;

(e) every person aged 50 to 74 for the eight-yearly variables of the detailed topic on ‘pensions and labour market participation’;

(f) every person aged 15 to 34 for the eight-yearly variables of the detailed topics on ‘young people on the labour market’ and ‘educational attainment — details, including education interrupted or abandoned’;

(g) every person aged 18 to 74 for the eight-yearly variables of the detailed topic on ‘reconciliation of work and family life’;

(h) every employed person aged 15 to 74 for the eight-yearly variables of the detailed topic on ‘work organisation and working time arrangements’.

All age groups include the limit ages specified therein.

Article 5

Reference periods and reference dates

(a) quarters of each year refer to the 12 months of the year divided by four so that January, February and March belong to the first quarter, April, May and June to the second quarter, July, August and September to the third quarter and October, November and December to the fourth quarter;

(b) the reference weeks are allocated to the reference quarters so that a week belongs to the quarter as defined in point (a) to which at least four days of that week belong (called ‘Thursday rule’), unless this results in the first quarter of the year consisting of only 12 weeks. In that case, the quarters of the year in question will be formed by consecutive blocks of 13 weeks;

(c) where, in accordance with point (b), a quarter consists of 14 weeks instead of 13 weeks Member States should attempt to spread the sample over all 14 weeks; that includes the option to divide the sample usually assigned to one week over 2 weeks;

(d) if it is not feasible to spread the sample to cover all 14 weeks of the quarter, the Member State concerned may skip one week of that quarter by not covering it;

(e) the weeks with a divided sample and the week to be skipped should be typical with regard to unemployment, employment and average actual hours worked and should be part of a month containing five Thursdays;

(f) the first quarter of 2021 shall begin on Monday, 4 January 2021.

Article 6

Detailed sample characteristics

(a) the sample assigned to one reference week shall be further divided over two typical reference weeks to cover all 14 weeks;

(b) one typical week shall be skipped in line with Article 5(3) of this Regulation.

(b) eight-yearly variables and variables on an ad hoc subject shall be transmitted for one sub-sample of independent observations that refer to all weeks of the reference year. That sub-sample shall be part of the sample for annual and biennial structural variables;

(c) sub-sampling as defined in points (a) and (b) shall always be applied using complete waves.

(a) the household sub-sample consists of independent observations that refer to all weeks of the reference year. The resulting annual sample shall, for the persons forming part of both the sample of persons belonging to private households and the household sub-sample, fulfil the distributional requirements as laid down in paragraphs 2 and 3 to the fullest extent possible;

(b) the household sub-sample comprises at least one wave per quarter or at least 15 000 households.

(a) a sample of persons;

(b) a household sub-sample as defined under paragraph 8; and

(c) a sub-sample for the eight-yearly detailed topics different than the household sub-sample;

shall transmit, for all members of households to which the persons selected for answering in a given year the eight-yearly detailed topic belong, and for the same reference periods, all parts of the topics ‘technical items’ and ‘persons and household characteristics’ which also form part of the minimum set of variables.

This transmission shall apply to the eight-yearly detailed topics ‘labour market situation of migrants and their immediate descendants’, ‘pensions and labour market participation’ and ‘reconciliation of work and family life’.

Article 7

Data gathering periods and methods

Article 8

Methodology for data on employment and unemployment

Article 9

Common standards for editing, imputation, weighting and estimation

(a) the weighting factors shall be calculated taking into account the probability of selection and external data on the distribution of the population being surveyed, by sex, age groups and region (NUTS 2 level). Five-year age groups shall be the standard. However, given the sample size and the quality and availability of the external data, aggregations that include more than one five-year age group are allowed only to the necessary extent;

(b) consistency between annual totals of sub-samples for annual and biennial structural variables and full-sample annual averages shall be ensured for employment, unemployment and outside the labour force by sex and for the following age groups: 25-34, 35-44, and 45-54. Consistency for the groups of persons aged 15-24, 55-64, and 65 and over shall be achieved to the fullest extent possible.

(a) the weighting factors shall be calculated taking into account the probability of selection and data on the distribution of the private households being surveyed, namely the (real or estimated) number of households and the (real or estimated) household size (household level), and the distribution of the population being surveyed, by sex and at least age groups 0-14 and 15+ (individual level). Estimates of the number of households and the household size shall be based on the best sources and concepts available;