Unit wage costs: Manufacturing C SIC07, % change on Q, SA, UK

We have identified and corrected an error with the way employment costs were calculated for the aggregation of services industries. This has impacted the calculations of unit labour costs and average labour compensation per hour worked for the services industries aggregation from Quarter 2 (April to June) 2020 onwards. When deducting subsidies from employment costs, the amounts to be deducted were miscalculated, due to the wrong industry aggregation being used.

A similar error was found in the calculation of unit wage costs in the manufacturing industry. Manufacturing subsidies were miscalculated due to a human error, which affects the ‘Manufacturing’ from Quarter 2 (April to June) 2020 onwards.

The initial compilation of Unit Labour Costs for the October 7th publication failed to include the various government schemes, introduced during the first lockdown, as part of the ULC calculation. These schemes are employment subsidies and should have been deducted from total labour costs to give a more accurate interpretation of the labour costs of productive faced by producers of goods and services.