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Purpose and history
The purpose of the RAS statistics is to provide a description of the Danish population's attachment to the labour market at a given moment en time (at the end of November). To do so the variable socio-economic status is used.RAS statistics follows the international guidelines set by the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The guidelines are directed at Surveys (Labour Force Surveys) where information about attachment to the labour market is given by respondents. In RAS the guidelines from ILO have been adjusted to the fit the possibilities available when using material based on registers.

The first version of the RAS statistics includes the population resident in Denmark as of the 1 January 1981 and its attachment to the labour market at the end of November 1980. The statistics have been compiled once every year over the period 1981 to 2009.

Description of Contents
The register-based labour force statistics (RAS) are annual status observations of the population's attachment to the labour market at a given point-in-time at the end of November.

The most essential variable in the statistic is the variable socio-economic status. By using this variable the population can be divided into 3 main groups which are;

• employed persons
• unemployed persons
• persons outside the labour force

Employed persons are either employees, self-employed or assisting spouses. Persons outside the labour force are divided into 4 groups. Persons temporarily outside the labour force, retired from the labour force, Pensioners and others outside the labour force.

In some cases a person can be part several different groups at the time of reference (they are a part of more than one gross stock). To determine the most important attachment to the labour market an order of priority is used. The order of priority is based on the principles for the population's attachment to the labour market as given from ILO and the quality of the sources.

In 2003 there is at databreak in the statistics. The labour market had changed during the years and also better and more reliable data sources had emerged. The changes also implied small changes in the order of priority.

In 2009 there is another databreak in the statistics. Before 2009 data source for employees was the central salary register. This register based on early reports from employers to the tax authorities. On the central salary slip the employer had the possibility to report that the employee had been employed during the whole year. If that was not the case the emloyer should report the starting date and the ending date of the period in which the person had been employed. Statistics Denmark suppose that employers have reported that the person has been employed during the whole year in to many cases.

From 2009 the e-income register replaces the central salary register as the data source for employment for employees. The e-income register is based on monthly information from employers. This implies that the information concerning the period of employment has a higher quality. It also implies that the level of employment is lower on account of the new data source.

In 2009 a yearly version of the e-income register, based on the monthly reports, and made by the tax authorities is used for the statistics. From 2010 the RAS-statistics will be based directly on the monthly reports.

Background information in the statistics
The RAS-statistics contains background infomation related to both the person and the work place. The most important infomation concerning the work place are;

- industry
- adress
- sector

The data sources for the infomation about the persons are different registers in from the social statistic in Statistics Denmark, among others

- demografic information
- educational information

The RAS-statistics has unic identification codes for both the work place and the person. Therefore futher information can be connected to the register.

The statistic has information about the the adress of the work place and the residental adress of the person which is used to make statistics on commuting.

Statistical Concepts
The population in the RAS statistics are persons resident in Denmark on January 1. The populations attachment to the labour market at the end of November the year before is measured.

The RAS statistics contain a number of variables. The most important variable is socio-economic status, which is defined for each person in the population. The population is divided into following groups:

1. Self-employed
2. Assisting spouses
3. Top managers
4. Employees upper level
5. Employees medium level
6. Employees basic level
7. Other employees
8. Employees not specified- Unemployed
1-8=Employed persons

9. Unemployed
1-9=Labour force

10. Employed in a labour market policy scheme without pay
11. Persons participation in guidance and educational schemes
12. Participants in integration education
13. Participants in rehabilitaion programs
14. Parental leave
15. Maternity leave
16. Sickness leave
17. Recipents of unemployment benefits
18. Modtagere af flexydelse
19. Persons who are partly unemployed during reference week
10-19=Temporary outside the labour force

20. Recipients of early pay
20=Withdrawal from the labour force

21. Recipients of old age pension
22. Recipients of early retirement pension
23. Recipeints of other pensions
21-23=Pensioners

24. Recipients of introduction payment
25. Recipients of cash benefits
26. Children and young people
27. Persons in education
28. Others outside the labour force
24-28=Others outside the labour force
10-28=Persons outside the labour force

Special notes regarding socioeconomic status for employees
Employees are divided into levels of skills based on DISCO-88. The level of skills is achieved through education or learning in praxis. The employees are divided into six groups

1. Top managers in enterprises, organizations and the public sector
2. Employees doing work that requires upper level skills.
3. Employees doing work that requires medium level skills.
4. Employees doing work that requires basic level skills.
5. Other employees
6. Employees not specified

Group 1: Includes managerial work at the upper administrative level in enterprises and organizations- regardless of size or skill requirements. The work consists of decision making, planning and controlling etc.

Group 2: Includes work that requires upper level skills. The group includes physicists, building engineers, architects, doctors, midwives, teachers, lawyers, accountants, librarians, journalists, actors, musicians, priests.

Group 3: Includes work that requires medium level skills. The work consists of technical work in production and transport, as well as assistance in trade and administration. Also in consists of education and caretaking in kindergartens and residential homes for children and young persons together with nursing and assisting work in the health sector e.g. laboratory technician, computer programmer, photographer, nurse, kindergarten teacher, real estate agent, police officer.

Group 4: Includes work that requires basic level skills. The work consists of office work, customer service, surveillance, rescue work, farm work, gardening, crafts oriented work and operating different types of stationary machinery.

Group 5: this is a residual group. It contains work that does not belong to one of the other groups e.g. cleaning, delivering services, guard work, packing and transport work without the use of machinery.

Group 6: Contains persons where skill level cannot be determined, due to missing information in the statistic registers.
The period 1997-2003
The information regarding the level of skills for employees working in the State, Counties and Municipalities is collected from Earnings Statistics on central and local government employees. Information on employees in the private sector comes either from Earnings Statistics for the private sector, or from the unemployment statistics register, or from the education classification module. The information from Earnings Statistics relates to the persons most important job during the year, this might not be the same job, in which the person is employed at the end of November.

The period 2004-
From 2004 the level of skills is for 67 pct. of the employed directly connected to the job they are managing at the end of November. Therefore there is a much better coherence between the level of skill and variables of industry and sector. For some part of the employees, information about earnings is still missing. For these persons other sources such as information about education and line of industry, and membership of unemployment insurance fund are used. Today people can choice more freely between unemployment insurance funds. This makes it harder to establish the level of skill, when the only source is membership of such a fund. As a consequence the group: Employees not specified has grown.

The periode 2009-
The number of employees not specified is much lower in 2009 than in 2008. The reason is that from 2009 the reported data to the earnings statistics is used. Before 2009 only data in the final earningsregister (where many reports have been excluded) were used.

About the level of skills
As a consequence of validating information about earnings, the number of reports from the private sector fluctuates across years. Therefore it is advised to be very careful, when using information about socioeconomic status for employees. Analysis of the development in number of employees at a specific skill level must always take into account the development of the employees not specified.

  Read more about the statistics on 'Register-based labour force statistics (RAS statistics)' in our Declarations of contents

Releases

Last updated:	27 August 2010
Scheduled releases:	10 June 2011 for the period 1 January 2010

Contact

Pernille Stender
Telephone:	+ 45 39 17 34 04
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