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Composition of Percentiles

Composition of Percentiles

Employments in the Information & Communication sector accounted for the largest proportion of employments in the 95th earnings percentile (21.2%) in 2023

CSO statistical publication, , 11am
Release Note

Data in relation to hours worked is not available through the PMOD file which is used to create the Earnings Analysis using Administrative Data Sources (EAADS) dataset. However, this data is provided in the CSO's Labour Force Survey (LFS). Hours worked may provide additional insights into the difference in earnings, particularly between males and females. LFS data shows that in general males tend to work more hours per week compared with their female counterparts.

A considerable proportion of employments in the lower earnings percentiles include employments related to Community Employment (CE) Schemes, generally among males in the Human Health & Social Work sector. In 2023, most of these employments were recorded in the 10th earnings percentile. In previous years, these employments were recorded between the 8th and 14th earnings percentiles, which are not presented in this analysis.

The following analysis is based on the overall earnings percentiles of total employments. The analysis presented below focuses on the composition of earnings percentiles in terms of sex, age group, economic sector, public/private sector status, and enterprise size.

Sex

The composition of weekly earnings percentiles by sex for 2023 is presented in Figure 3.1. In general, the proportion of employments held by males tended to be greater than the proportion of employments held by females across each percentile presented, with the exception of the 20th and 30th earnings percentiles.

There was a notable difference in the proportion of male employments in comparison with female employments in the 90th percentile, where male employments accounted for 60.8% of all employments. The opposite was the case in the 20th percentile where female employments accounted for 60.6% of the total employments (See Table DDA04).

Figure 3.1 Composition of weekly earnings percentiles by sex, 2023

Age Group

In general, weekly earnings tended to increase with age, with median weekly earnings at their highest among employments in the 40-49 years age category. Employments among those aged 15-24 years accounted for 15.4% of employments in the 10th percentile, compared with 0.4% of employments with earnings in the 90th percentile.

Employments among those aged 50-59 years accounted for the largest proportion of employments with earnings in the 10th percentile at 25.2% in 2023, followed by those aged 60 years and over at 22.6%. In contrast, employments among the 40-49 years age group accounted for more than one-third (35.9%) of employments in the 90th percentile (See Table DDA05).

Figure 3.2 Composition of weekly earnings percentiles by age group, 2023

Economic Sector

Economic sector was an important variable in terms of the composition of earnings percentiles. Employments in Human Health & Social Work accounted for the largest proportion of employments recorded in the 10th percentile at 57.3% in 2023. The Industry and Public Administration & Defence sectors contributed the greatest proportion of employments to the 90th percentile, at 15.6% and 12.6%, respectively (See Table DDA06).

Figure 3.3 below presents the percentage of employments in each economic sector by earnings percentile, i.e., the percentage of employments in a given sector that fell into the overall nth earnings percentile in 2023. Among employments in sectors where median weekly earnings were lower, the Accommodation & Food sector for example, a greater proportion of employments were recorded in the lower percentiles, compared with employments in sectors with higher median earnings such as the Information & Communication and Financial, Insurance & Real Estate sectors.

Figure 3.3 Composition of weekly earnings percentiles by economic sector, 2023

Public/Private Sector

Employments within the private sector accounted for the majority of all employments in each of the earnings percentiles presented in Figure 3.4, however the proportion represented by private sector employments tended to decrease with increased earnings.

In 2023, the proportion of private sector employments was highest in the 5th earnings percentile (94.4%) and lowest in the 85th percentile (60.0%). In contrast, the proportion of public sector employments increased with increased earnings, i.e., there were fewer public sector employments with low earnings compared with those in the private sector (See Table DDA07).

Figure 3.4 Composition of weekly earnings percentiles by public/private sector status, 2023

Enterprise Size

In general, smaller enterprises tended to represent a larger proportion of employments with lower earnings compared with larger enterprises.

Enterprises with less than 50 employees accounted for more than seven in ten employments with earnings in the 10th percentile (70.1%), while enterprises with 250 employees or more accounted for, at a minimum, more than 56% of employments in the 60th, 70th, 80th, and 90th percentiles, as presented in Figure 3.5 below (See Table DDA08).

Figure 3.5 Composition of weekly earnings percentiles by enterprise size, 2023