Press Statement

Preasráiteas

16 January 2018

Go to release: Labour Force Survey (LFS) Quarter 3 2017

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (16^th January 2018) issued results from the new Labour Force Survey (LFS) in respect of Q3 2017. This survey replaced the Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS) from the beginning of Q3 2017.

This new survey has seen the introduction of Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI), a redesigned questionnaire and enhancements to the survey methodology.

The results presented in this report incorporate adjustments to the QNHS data series to take account of revisions to population estimates arising from the 2016 Census of Population and an adjustment to reflect the level in the new LFS.

Commenting on the report, Jim Dalton, Statistician said: “The LFS has replaced the QNHS as the official source of data for employment and unemployment in Ireland.

Key findings show that in Q3 2017, employment totalled 2,206,800, up 2.2% or 48,100 from the same quarter in 2016. When adjusted for seasonal factors, employment increased by 0.5% or 10,300 from Q2 2017.

There were 163,500 people unemployed in Q3 2017 and this was down 18.6% or 37,400 from Q3 2016. When seasonally adjusted, the unemployment rate remained at 6.7% over the quarter, while the seasonally adjusted number of persons unemployed was 156,400.

Long term unemployment, which refers to those persons unemployed for one year or more, accounted for 40.0% of total unemployment in Q3 2017 compared to 49.5% a year earlier.

The total number of persons in the labour force is now 2,370,400, up 0.5% or 10,700 from Q3 2016. The number of persons not in the labour force is 1,428,400 which is up 2.8% or 38,400 from a year earlier”.

Please see the separate information note accompanying this release for further details on the change from the QNHS to the LFS, revisions to population estimates and enhancements to the survey methodology now employed by the LFS.

Go to : LFS Information Note

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