The COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions applied in response to it had a significant impact on the labour market in 2020 and 2021. Earnings statistics for those years and comparisons with earlier years are impacted by changes in the composition of the labour market across 2020 and 2021 and when compared to 2019 and earlier years. The level of earnings has also been impacted by the COVID-19 income support schemes in place in 2020 and 2021.
Median weekly earnings were €644.55 in 2021, an increase of 2.4% from €629.46 in 2020.
In 2021 median weekly earnings for males were €711.87 compared with €570.22 for females.
Median weekly earnings rose by 18.7% over the five years from 2016 to 2021.
The economic sectors with the highest median weekly earnings were Information & Communication (€1,154.56) and Financial, Insurance & Real Estate Activities (€915.06). The sector with the lowest earnings was Accommodation & Food Services Activities (€346.13).
Of employments that were active in October 2021, 20.0% were supported by the Wage Subsidy Schemes (WSS) at some point during that year, compared with 29.9% in 2020.
WSS payments accounted for 4.4% of total earnings across all employments in 2021.
Of employments that were active in October 2020, 75.9% were also active in October 2021. For those employments that were active in both periods, median weekly earnings increased by 7.1%.
The Earnings Analysis using Administrative Data Sources (EAADS) publication presents earnings statistics compiled based on administrative data sources. The primary data source is the Revenue Commissioner’s employee tax data. This is linked to the CSO Business Register and other data to provide economic and demographic breakdowns of employee earnings in Ireland. The data used for this analysis has been restricted to employments that were active in the month of October 2021.
The Wage Subsidy Schemes include the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme (TWSS) which was active for part of 2020, and the Employment Wage Subsidy Scheme (EWSS) which was active for part of 2020 and all of 2021.
Please note: Estimates of earnings by size class for 2019 and 2020 have been revised to take account of the latest data available for firm sizes in those periods. The tables impacted are Tables 4.6 and 4.7 in this publication and PxStat Tables NSA90 and NSA99. Estimates of earnings for all size classes and breakdowns by other characteristics have not been affected.
| Table 1.1 Median1 weekly earnings by sex | |||||||||
| 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | Annual Change (2020-2021) | Five Year Change (2016-2021) | ||
| € | € | € | € | € | € | % | % | ||
| Male | 599.92 | 615.37 | 636.63 | 666.22 | 690.56 | 711.87 | 3.1 | 18.7 | |
| Female | 479.88 | 488.85 | 500.00 | 523.10 | 561.23 | 570.22 | 1.6 | 18.8 | |
| Total | 543.04 | 556.61 | 573.35 | 598.36 | 629.46 | 644.55 | 2.4 | 18.7 | |
| Source: CSO Ireland, Earnings Analysis using Administrative Data Sources | |||||||||
| 1Median weekly earnings: Half of the employees earn more than this amount and half earn less. | |||||||||
| X-axis label | Male | Female | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | 1.63828886065225 | 1.33671206841939 | 1.71193107323468 |
| 2017 | 2.57534337911722 | 1.86921730432608 | 2.49889510901593 |
| 2018 | 3.45483205226125 | 2.28086325048582 | 3.00749178060042 |
| 2019 | 4.64791165983383 | 4.62 | 4.36208249760182 |
| 2020 | 3.65344781003272 | 7.28923723953354 | 5.19753994250953 |
| 2021 | 3.08590129749768 | 1.60183881830978 | 2.397292917739 |
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (05 May 2023) issued Earnings Analysis using Administrative Data Sources for 2021.
Commenting on the data, Morgan O'Donnell, Statistician in the Earnings Analysis Division, said: "Median weekly earnings were €644.55 in 2021, an increase of 2.4% from €629.46 in 2020.
Median weekly earnings
In 2021 median weekly earnings for males were €711.87 compared with €570.22 for females.
The economic sectors with the highest median weekly earnings were Information & Communication (€1,154.56) and Financial, Insurance & Real Estate Activities (€915.06). The sector with the lowest earnings was Accommodation & Food Services Activities (€346.13).
Median weekly earnings rose by 18.7% over the five years from 2016 to 2021.
Impact of COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic and the restrictions applied in response to it had a significant impact on the labour market in 2020 and 2021.
The Wage Subsidy Schemes (WSS) supported 20.0% of employments in 2021. The Accommodation & Food Services Activities sector had the highest proportion of employments supported in both 2020 (81.9%) and 2021 (78.1%).
The WSS represented 47.6% of total earnings in the Accommodation & Food Services Activities sector in 2021, compared with 31.8% in 2020. WSS payments accounted for 4.4% of total earnings across all employments in 2021.
Distribution of Earnings
As is typical in earnings distributions, a relatively small number of high earners result in a positively skewed earnings distribution of employees in Ireland. In a positively skewed earnings distribution, mean earnings are greater than median earnings as the mean is increased by those higher earners.
In 2021, almost 65.0% of employments earned less than the mean or average weekly earnings of €820.95. Median weekly earnings in 2021 were €644.55 with half of all employments earning more than this amount and half earning less.
Earnings by County
Looking at earnings by county, median weekly earnings for Dublin were €708.08 in 2021. This was 9.9% higher than the median weekly earnings for the State at €644.55, and 36.7% higher than Donegal which, at €517.93, had the lowest median weekly earnings."