Average earnings
Gross earnings constitute the biggest part of total labour costs.
However, comparisons of labour costs based on data on average gross earnings have certain limitations.
For countries where such data is collected by local national statistical offices coverage may vary in terms of
sectors covered: whole economy, economy excluding agriculture, manufacturing sector
ownership sectors: all enterprises, public sector, private sector
geographic coverage: total country, metropolitan areas, capital city
scope: all enterprises, enterprises employing certain minimum number of employees
units: all employees, full time, full time equivalent
Those issues are especially pertinent when dealing with data from emerging markets beyond the CEE region where statistical reporting is not as sophisticated.
However, even assuming identical coverage and methodology, data on gross earnings disregards the level of additional costs on top of gross earnings. In the CEE region additional obligatory social security contributions paid on top of gross earnings vary from 16% to over 43% between different countries.