By Eurostat

This report describes the main characteristics of the European Union Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS) conducted in 2019 in the Member States of the European Union (EU), three EFTA countries (Iceland, Norway and Switzerland), the United Kingdom and four candidate countries (Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey). All of these countries provide Eurostat with EU-LFS microdata. The purpose of this report is to inform about the technical features of the surveys carried out in these countries, in order to enable users to interpret the EU-LFS results accurately. The EU-LFS has been based on European legislation since 1973. The principal legal act is the Council Regulation (EC) No 577/98. The regulations are an important element assuring the quality of the EU-LFS. In all countries, the EU-LFS is organised and managed by the National Statistical Institutes. The EU-LFS is designed as a continuous quarterly survey which measures the labour status and other characteristics of the population in each quarter, by spreading the sample uniformly over all the weeks of the quarter. The main characteristics of the national practices are presented in this report. The information is mostly organised along the same lines as in ‘The European Union Labour Force Survey: Main Characteristics of the National Surveys 2018’. This will enable users to evaluate the degree of comparability achieved. Country sheets include a section on the main conceptual, methodological or organisational changes introduced in recent years, to allow the reader to have an idea of recent changes at a glance. Tables 1 to 3 (in Annex) provide summary information on some of the characteristics described in the report.

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