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Identifier: 001616965

Date of last update: March 07, 2013

Unemployment according to the ILO and job market indicators

Results of the employment survey

Sources used

The continuous Employment Survey is a household survey covering all people aged 15 and over living in Metropolitan France. It is a quarterly survey whose results are collected continuously across all the weeks of each quarter.

Around 45,000 ordinary households are surveyed each quarter (that is to say the residents of 45,000 residences, not including communal residences: hostels, hospitals, prisons), which makes around 75,000 people aged 15 or over. This sample is partially renewed each quarter.

The survey is extended by means of a postal survey sent to those subjects who did not respond, the results of which are available at a later date. Around 1,500 households respond to this survey. Moreover, in order to improve the accuracy of the data on the job market, INSEE has been gradually increasing the size of the Employment Survey's sample since the first quarter of 2009. The operation will finish in September 2010 by which time the sample size will have increased by 50%. Since the publication of the results of the third quarter of 2009, the results published take account of the gradual increase in the sample size. It is expected that the Employment Survey's accuracy will improve, without causing significant disruption to the series in terms of the levels estimated.

Series and method

The Employment Survey covers all situations relating to the job market: employment, unemployment, retirement, studies, inactivity, etc.. It is, furthermore, the only source which corresponds to the definitions on unemployment, employment, under-employment and professional activity recommended by the International Labour Office (ILO).

The rate of unemployment is calculated as the ratio of unemployed to professionally active respondents (numbers in and out of employment).

Other job market indicators reflect the structure of the population (employment, unemployment and professional activity), the nature of employment and circumstances which almost qualify as unemployment. These indicators directly translate the results of the on-going Employment Survey. All of the series are corrected for seasonal variation. The corrective coefficient calculation for seasonal variation is reviewed each quarter, which can lead to slight revisions across the whole series.

Publication and revision of the series

The quarterly results of the Employment Survey for a given quarter are published at the start of the third month following the end of that quarter. The results for the last available month are provisional. The surveys from those who do not respond (ENR) to the said quarter are not available on the date of publication. Therefore a revision is carried out in the following quarter, integrating the results of the secondary survey for subjects who did not respond to the survey within the quarter. For the results of the current quarter, an extrapolation is carried out based on the results of the ENR from the previous quarters.

The seasonal adjustment corrective coefficients are recalculated every quarter which results in very small-scale revisions.

Lastly, the regular revisions of demographic data carried out using annual census surveys can cause small changes to the employment numbers and rates estimated in the Employment Survey.

Definitions

• An unemployed person according to the International Labour Office (ILO)

  is a person of working age (conventionally 15 years or more) who:

  1. Hasn't worked, for even an hour, in the week in question,
  2. Would be available to work within two weeks and
  3. Has undertaken steps to actively seek work in the preceding month, or has found a job which starts within 3 months.
• The proportion of unemployed people across the total population

  Differs from and is inferior to the unemployment rate, which is the relationship between the number of unemployed and the number of people who are professionally active (employed or unemployed). The proportion of unemployment across the total population is used above all to moderate the very high levels of unemployment among the under 25s. As many young people are in education and professionally inactive, and compared to other age brackets relatively few have a job, their rate of unemployment is very high even though the number of truly unemployed people in this age category is actually much lower.

• The rate of professional activity of a category of people

  Is the relationship between the number of people who are professionally active (employed or unemployed) and the total population of the category.

• The employment rate of a category of people

  Is the relationship between the number of people who have a job and the total population in the category.

• The employment rate as an equivalent to full time

  The number of people in employment working the equivalent of full time hours in their main job, as a proportion of the corresponding total population.

• The full-time employment rate of a category of people

  Is calculated by comparing the number of people in a category who have a full time job to the total number of people in the category.

• The part-time employment rate of a category of people

  Is calculated by comparing the number of people in the category who have a part-time job to the total number of people in the category.

• The underlying rate of employment

  Is equal to the mathematical average of the unemployment rates for different age brackets. It is therefore not weighted to take account of the size of the different categories; it allows us to discount the particularly strong effects of demographic composition, starting in 2001 with the arrival of the first groups from the baby-boom in the 55+ age category, which significantly affects the employment rates of this age category.

• L'espérance apparente d'activité

  est égale à la somme des taux d'activité à chaque âge observés une période donnée. Il représente la durée moyenne d'activité, en années, d'une génération fictive soumise aux conditions d'activité de la période. Il est indépendant de la structure démographique. Cet indicateur est qualifié d'apparent car il ne tient pas compte des décès qui peuvent intervenir au cours de la période d'activité.

• Apparent expectation of working life

  Is equal to the sum of the professional activity rates for each age observed over a given period. It represents the average duration of professional activity, in years of a fictitious generation who go through the working conditions of that period. It is not connected to the demographic structure. This indicator is called "apparent" because it does not take into account any deaths which happen over the course of the period of activity.

• Under-employment according to the ILO

  Covers people who have a part-time job who hope to work more hours over a given week, and who are available to do so, whether they are searching for a job or not. People who have voluntarily worked fewer hours than normal (technical unemployment...) are also included in under-employment.

• People without a job who wish to work

  These people are not necessarily unemployed according to the ILO, as for example they are unavailable during the two working weeks, or because they have not taken the necessary active steps in looking for a job in the preceding month. These two criteria, necessary to be considered as unemployed according to the ILO, are relaxed alternately and then simultaneously

  This concept allows us to describe the section which is often described as the "mystery" of unemployment, that is to say the people who are not necessarily considered as unemployed according to the ILO, but who are, however, in a situation "close" to unemployment. In table form (based on the data from 2009's third quarter):

  
  

  

  
  

Not all of those considered unemployed by the ILO are necessarily included in those who wish to work: a proportion of the unemployed who have found a job which starts at a later date do not declare that they wish to work at the time of the survey. Those unemployed by the ILO definition therefore fall into three categories:

• The overwhelming majority are to be found amongst those who wish to work, are available to do so and are taking the necessary steps to look for work. A proportion of these unemployed people could have found a job which starts at a later date.
• Amongst those unemployed according to the ILO who have found a job which starts at a later date, another section can be found in the category of those who want to work, and are available to do so, but have not taken the necessary steps to find a job.
• Lastly, a third section of these unemployed people who have a job which starts at a later date are not in the category of those who wish to work, as they have not expressed this wish at the time of the survey (the section surrounded by a double line in the table)...

Those unemployed who find themselves in the first category are commonly called PSERE unemployed (population without a job, looking for a job). There were 2,469,000 in this category in the third quarter of 2009.

The two first categories together represent the total of the unemployed according to the ILO amongst those who wish to work (the section surrounded by a bold line in the table).

Lastly, all three categories together represent total unemployment according to the ILO (section in grey in the table).

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