The CSO has put together a new set of data on job churn in Ireland, providing much more detail on sectoral job destruction and job creation, plus other dimensions of labour market data.
thanks for highlighting this, it is a very valuable resource.
One thing I hope it does is dispel the myth that the entire economic slump is all to do with construction.
The data show 505,000 jobs were lost between 2007 and 2009. Constructon jobs fell by 135,000,, little more than a quarter of all jobs lost. 58,000 industrial jobs were also lost, nearly all of them in manufacturing (55,000). 21,000 professional and scientifice jobs were lost. Hotels and restaurants lost 60,000 jobs, while retail lost 68,000, and so on.
This is not a burst bubble. A wasteland has been created.
Am I just missing the public admin and education sectors or are they just not there?
Hi Michael,
I think one has to be careful in analysing these numbers. A change in the number of “employment records” does not necessarily mean a change in the number of jobs.
If a job exists for a year but is filled by a different person for each month of the year, then that job would have 12 employment records. If during the following year one person fills the job the number of employment records will be one. I do not think we would view this as 11 jobs lost but the number of employment records would have fallen from 12 to 1.
It is better to look at the “job creation” and “job destruction” numbers if we want to explore changes in the number of jobs but this also has limitations.
For example between 2007 and 2009 that 988,000 jobs were created and 1,302,000 jobs were destroyed – a loss of 314,000. For industry the change was -41,500 with a change of -42,000 for manufacturing.
For construction the change was -126,000 or nearly 40% of the total.
Other sectors with substantial losses are retail (-43,500), accomodation and food service (-41,500), administration and support (-35,500) and profession and technical (-11,000).
This would tie in with the figures from the QNHS and do show that job losses have not been limited to the construction sector. The Job Churn figures give a useful insight into the flows in and out of employment that the QNHS does not.
Seamus Coffey wrote,
If a job exists for a year but is filled by a different person for each month of the year, then that job would have 12 employment records. If during the following year one person fills the job the number of employment records will be one. I do not think we would view this as 11 jobs lost but the number of employment records would have fallen from 12 to 1.
The problem is, I don’t think we could even count that job as a decent ‘one’ job. Is it possible to have a zero point something, and add up all of the zero point something(s), until we finally get a number that looks like one point zero. I mean, like the way we talk about couples having one point five children on average or something. In my own estimation, a job which cannot even break the 12 month threshold in terms of sustainability, doesn’t deserve to be counted as a full unit. Because of all the associated costs in terms of movement, administration on the part of many people, to process that person in and out of this system and that. In other words, to maintain a job, which is really the equivalent of 0.1 job(s), you maybe need 2-3 people employed full time, to do nothing other than handle all the administration and nonsense that goes with keeping the 0.1 job, filled 10x times. BOH.
Seamus
For example between 2007 and 2009 that 988,000 jobs were created and 1,302,000 jobs were destroyed – a loss of 314,000. For industry the change was -41,500 with a change of -42,000 for manufacturing.
The numbers don’t stack up. Maybe the net number does but both ‘job creation’ and ‘job destruction’ figures are not believable. They are far too high! 1,302,000 jobs destroyed in two years?
There could be a number of reasons for this.
The P35L is a good source of data but will include all of the following:
1. Part-time, short-time, double jobbers i.e Not full time jobs.
2. When a person leaves for seasonal reasons or other and returns to the same employer even within the same tax year, they are given a new employment number within that organization. [The reason for this is that some payroll software systems are not designed to cope adequately with this if correct Revenue returns are to be generated].
The P35L will show the same person exiting the employment several times and entering employment several times. All to the same job. And all within the same organization.
I wonder if this duplication is removed by data filters and the methodology used.
This is a very worthwhile exercise by the CSO and if the data is filtered correctly using PPS numbers then it should be possible to generate good data.
Based on a quick look at the just one chart data, it requires further work to get it right.
@ Seamus Coffey,
This is what I would propose.
1 job filled 12 times = 0.25 of a job (at best, and possibly worse owing to overhead of administration to keep it filled). In fact, it could be something like:
1 job filled 12 times – 0.00 job.
Because the work in administration to keep the job filled, cancels out completely the achievement of the job in the first place. In extreme cases, the number may even be negative!
But lets go back to the 0.25 fraction for the sake of making an argument. Now look at what we need to make up 1.0 job(s).
0.25 x 4.0 = 1.0 job(s).
In other words, by my calculations, we now require (4 x 12), or no less than 48 job records, associated with something, which at best makes up one lousy, low paying, wage packet. BOH.
@all
Useful data.
On the other hand:
Be neat to see a good bit of ‘churning’ on all those bank boards, state boards, semi-state boards, and the upper managerial echelons of all those institutions (public and private) that failed abysmally in their ‘duty of care’ to the Irish Citizenry …..
…. drat, double_drat … can’t seem to find any supporting empirics of such ‘churning’ anywhere – one must assume that Senior Counselves advised against it …. ‘churning’ must be only for the leetle peeple …..
Is there a figure for the total amount of workers in a code?
I am trying to figure out the data because we all know the legal sector is sheltered (per Pat Rabbitte, Mary Coughlan, IMF/EU MoU) but the figures for 2009 include the following:
All workers – Volume of work accounted for in year t (Person years) =12,718.3
Job creation (Number) =1,176
Job destruction (Number) =4,461
Surely I am missing something? I think it is because I bumped my head tripping over a pile of unemployed solcitors on my way to work.
@ Zhou
Would apprentices be part of the numbers?
According to CSO Business Demography stats, there were 21,245 persons engaged in Legal Activities (691) in 2008.
There have been a few redundancies among solicitors of my acquaintance, which largely consists of solicitors who are on the Dublin Legal Aid Panel. Part of the job destruction would also include people moving from one firm to another.
11 replies on “Job Churn in Ireland”
Philip
thanks for highlighting this, it is a very valuable resource.
One thing I hope it does is dispel the myth that the entire economic slump is all to do with construction.
The data show 505,000 jobs were lost between 2007 and 2009. Constructon jobs fell by 135,000,, little more than a quarter of all jobs lost. 58,000 industrial jobs were also lost, nearly all of them in manufacturing (55,000). 21,000 professional and scientifice jobs were lost. Hotels and restaurants lost 60,000 jobs, while retail lost 68,000, and so on.
This is not a burst bubble. A wasteland has been created.
Am I just missing the public admin and education sectors or are they just not there?
Hi Michael,
I think one has to be careful in analysing these numbers. A change in the number of “employment records” does not necessarily mean a change in the number of jobs.
If a job exists for a year but is filled by a different person for each month of the year, then that job would have 12 employment records. If during the following year one person fills the job the number of employment records will be one. I do not think we would view this as 11 jobs lost but the number of employment records would have fallen from 12 to 1.
It is better to look at the “job creation” and “job destruction” numbers if we want to explore changes in the number of jobs but this also has limitations.
For example between 2007 and 2009 that 988,000 jobs were created and 1,302,000 jobs were destroyed – a loss of 314,000. For industry the change was -41,500 with a change of -42,000 for manufacturing.
For construction the change was -126,000 or nearly 40% of the total.
Other sectors with substantial losses are retail (-43,500), accomodation and food service (-41,500), administration and support (-35,500) and profession and technical (-11,000).
This would tie in with the figures from the QNHS and do show that job losses have not been limited to the construction sector. The Job Churn figures give a useful insight into the flows in and out of employment that the QNHS does not.
Seamus Coffey wrote,
The problem is, I don’t think we could even count that job as a decent ‘one’ job. Is it possible to have a zero point something, and add up all of the zero point something(s), until we finally get a number that looks like one point zero. I mean, like the way we talk about couples having one point five children on average or something. In my own estimation, a job which cannot even break the 12 month threshold in terms of sustainability, doesn’t deserve to be counted as a full unit. Because of all the associated costs in terms of movement, administration on the part of many people, to process that person in and out of this system and that. In other words, to maintain a job, which is really the equivalent of 0.1 job(s), you maybe need 2-3 people employed full time, to do nothing other than handle all the administration and nonsense that goes with keeping the 0.1 job, filled 10x times. BOH.
Seamus
The numbers don’t stack up. Maybe the net number does but both ‘job creation’ and ‘job destruction’ figures are not believable. They are far too high! 1,302,000 jobs destroyed in two years?
There could be a number of reasons for this.
The P35L is a good source of data but will include all of the following:
1. Part-time, short-time, double jobbers i.e Not full time jobs.
2. When a person leaves for seasonal reasons or other and returns to the same employer even within the same tax year, they are given a new employment number within that organization. [The reason for this is that some payroll software systems are not designed to cope adequately with this if correct Revenue returns are to be generated].
The P35L will show the same person exiting the employment several times and entering employment several times. All to the same job. And all within the same organization.
I wonder if this duplication is removed by data filters and the methodology used.
This is a very worthwhile exercise by the CSO and if the data is filtered correctly using PPS numbers then it should be possible to generate good data.
Based on a quick look at the just one chart data, it requires further work to get it right.
@ Seamus Coffey,
This is what I would propose.
1 job filled 12 times = 0.25 of a job (at best, and possibly worse owing to overhead of administration to keep it filled). In fact, it could be something like:
1 job filled 12 times – 0.00 job.
Because the work in administration to keep the job filled, cancels out completely the achievement of the job in the first place. In extreme cases, the number may even be negative!
But lets go back to the 0.25 fraction for the sake of making an argument. Now look at what we need to make up 1.0 job(s).
0.25 x 4.0 = 1.0 job(s).
In other words, by my calculations, we now require (4 x 12), or no less than 48 job records, associated with something, which at best makes up one lousy, low paying, wage packet. BOH.
@all
Useful data.
On the other hand:
Be neat to see a good bit of ‘churning’ on all those bank boards, state boards, semi-state boards, and the upper managerial echelons of all those institutions (public and private) that failed abysmally in their ‘duty of care’ to the Irish Citizenry …..
…. drat, double_drat … can’t seem to find any supporting empirics of such ‘churning’ anywhere – one must assume that Senior Counselves advised against it …. ‘churning’ must be only for the leetle peeple …..
Is there a figure for the total amount of workers in a code?
I am trying to figure out the data because we all know the legal sector is sheltered (per Pat Rabbitte, Mary Coughlan, IMF/EU MoU) but the figures for 2009 include the following:
All workers – Volume of work accounted for in year t (Person years) =12,718.3
Job creation (Number) =1,176
Job destruction (Number) =4,461
Surely I am missing something? I think it is because I bumped my head tripping over a pile of unemployed solcitors on my way to work.
@ Zhou
Would apprentices be part of the numbers?
According to CSO Business Demography stats, there were 21,245 persons engaged in Legal Activities (691) in 2008.
There have been a few redundancies among solicitors of my acquaintance, which largely consists of solicitors who are on the Dublin Legal Aid Panel. Part of the job destruction would also include people moving from one firm to another.