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Hourly labor costs rise in eurozone in Q1 2015: Eurostat

Xinhua, June 18, 2015 Adjust font size:

Hourly labor costs rose both in the 19-nation eurozone and in the wider European Union (EU) in the first quarter of 2015, Eurostat, the EU statistical office said on Thursday.

According to figures released by Eurostat, in the first quarter of this year, hourly labor costs rose by 2.2 percent in the euro area and by 2.5 percent in the EU compared with the same quarter of the previous year.

The two main components of labor costs are wages and salaries and non-wage costs. In the euro area, on a yearly basis, wages salaries per hour worked in the first quarter grew by 2.2 percent and the non-wage component by 2.1 percent.

Among member states, the highest annual increases in hourly labor costs for the whole economy were registered in Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania and Estonia. A decrease was recorded in Cyprus.

Figures also showed that in the fourth quarter of 2014, hourly labor costs increased by 1.2 percent in the euro area and by 1.5 percent in the EU. Endit