Italian Labour Force Survey – October (2013)

The Italian Labour Force Survey is the main source of statistical information on the Italian labor market. The information gathered from the population constitutes the basis on which official estimations of employment and unemployment are calculated, as well as information on the main job’s issues – occupation, sector of economic activity, hours worked, contracts’ type and duration, training.

The survey data are used to analyze a number of individual, family and social factors too, such as the increasing labor mobility, changing professions, the growth in female participation, etc.., which determine the difference in labor participation of population.

The questionnaire is divided into several sections. In particular, in addition to the first socio-demographic information, the first section covers the employment status during the interview’s week, dealing with questions about the type of work, hours worked, motivations about the unemployment status, the type of contract.

The second section – reserved for employed people – covers the main job, investigating in particular the position in the profession, the industry in which he works, the company he works for, working full-time or part-time and reasons for his selection, working hours, overtime hours, shift work, job transfer, salary, job satisfaction.

The third section – always reserved for employed people – concerns the secondary work (if any). It’s exclusively addressed to respondents who carry out another activity compared to the main one and only detects certain information such as: type of activity, type of contract, occupation, economic sector he works in.

The fourth section – for unemployed people – collects information about previous work experiences: last work, type of contract, occupation, economic sector, the reasons why it stopped working.

The fifth section deals with the job search. It investigates the reason for seeking a job, the actions put in place to look for it, the channels used to look for and the type of work sought.

The sixth section deals with employment and temp agencies and investigates their use by the respondents: number of contacts, reason for contact, services required.

The seventh section covers education and vocational education. It deals with the training courses respondents are attending.

The last section focuses on the auto-perception of their employment status, compared to the previous year.

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Keywords: employment, labour, unemployment