Data sources

The largest source of information for national accounts compilation is the information provided directly by enterprises. The statistical surveys are conducted on the basis of the register of statistical units. Statistical reports are available from the whole enterprise as well as from local sub- divisions. The questionnaires are differentiated by activities and also for units using double- or single-entry bookkeeping.

The main statistical surveys conducted by NSI and used for National Accounts purposes are as follows:

• annual bookkeeping statement, provided by all public and private enterprises with double-entry bookkeeping, including statistical annexes for production, employment, wages and salaries, investments and more detailed description of the assets;

• annual statistical report on revenues and expenditures, provided by private firms with single-entry bookkeeping;

• annual report of insurance enterprises, collected by NSI and based on the specific accounting standard of insurance undertakings;

• annual report of non-profit institutions based on the specific accounting standard and allowing output to be split between market and non-market output;

• annual report of investment funds; • annual report of pension funds; • PRODCOM Survey;

• agricultural balances in the methodological frame of Economic Accounts for Agriculture, containing detailed information about the supply of goods and their use in both quantity and value terms, compiled by type of production unit: state and co- operative agricultural farms, private farms and households;

• annual labour statistics on the average annual number of employees under labour contract, employed persons, wages and salaries and hours worked;

• labour force survey;

• material balances in quantity and value terms for about 200 commodity groups, realized/consumed in production process of enterprise and sub-division;

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• household budget survey with the information on the expenditures by COICOP groups, incomes from wages and salaries, social security, own production, preserved and processed food products etc.;

• monetary and banking statistics provided to NSI by Bulgarian National Bank (BNB). They include the annual balance sheets and income statements of BNB and commercial banks with more detailed breakdown of indicators;

• Balance of Payments;

• annual detailed information on the government budget, by separate budgetary units and functions;

• customs statistics;

• income declarations collected by Ministry of Finance;

• tax authorities’ information about the accrual of VAT and excise duty. 3.3 Employment data reconciliation. Value added due to unregistered employment

During 2002-2003, NSI took part in the Eurostat pilot project on Employment Data Reconciliation organized under the Phare 2000 Multi-Country Statistical Cooperation Programme. Besides the work done in the Project on the compilation of tables on employment (employment, hours worked and compensation of employees) according to the definitions of ESA 95, it also focused on the reconciliation of employment data derived from two flows:

• labour supply: the number of employed persons is obtained from the quarterly Labour Force Survey;

• labour demand: the number of employed persons is obtained from the quarterly labour report of enterprises.

For certain activities additional sources were used to supplement the LFS data:

• Farm Structure Survey: used for determining the number of self-employed in the agricultural sector (ESA branches A+B).

• Population Census: used for determining the number of self-employed in C and E classes and for consistency checks.

Statistical sources used for measuring employment

The Quarterly Labour Report provides information on the average quarterly number of employees with labour contracts, the time worked by them, their earnings and other labour. The survey covers all registered units with at least one employee. It is exhaustive for public sector enterprises and private enterprises with more than 50 employees. A stratified random sample is used to observe the private sector enterprises with 1-50 employees. The average number of employees is derived as a simple average. The persons working half day, half week, half month or less than four hours per day are included in the average number of employees after the transformation to full time equivalents is made.

The Labour Force Survey is carried out on a quarterly basis. It collects data from a sample of population 15 years and above, living in non-institutional households. The sample used includes 24 000 households. It is a two-stage stratified cluster sample, designed by regions, separately for urban and rural populations. The clusters in the first stage are the enumeration districts and in the second are households.

All data on employment are prepared on a quarterly basis. Yearly data are calculated as an average of the four quarters in a reference year.

Employment, domestic concept

The LFS and Labour Statistics (LS) data are adjusted and combined in order to achieve one general employment number compliant with the domestic concept. Data are prepared separately for employees and self-employed.

Data on employees are calculated as a sum of two components: employees working under labour contract and employees working with other than labour type of contract (as civil non-labour contract) or without any contract.

Except the NACE activities A, B, C and E, the data on the self-employed are estimated by mainly using the corresponding LFS data, adjusted in the same way as is described above for the employees by other type of labour contract.

For the estimation of self-employed in classes C and E, data from the March 2001 Population Census are used and applied for all 2001 quarters. Their number is small and the LFS could not provide reliable estimates.

A different approach is used for the estimation of self-employment in agriculture (A). Data are derived from Farm Structure Surveys (FSS), conducted by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. As with persons producing agricultural goods for their own consumption, these data mostly fit the NA concepts, whereas they are not entirely covered by the LFS or the Population Census. The disadvantage is that the information available from the FSS is relatively limited on the distinction between main and secondary jobs. For the purpose of the Project, data on full-time equivalents (FTE) is used – the number of annual working units (AWU), calculated for natural persons. Quarterly estimates are prepared on the basis of quarterly distribution of self-employed data in agriculture, in accordance with LFS.

Hours worked

Data on hours worked are prepared on a quarterly basis. Yearly data are calculated as a sum of the four quarters of the year. Generally data from quarterly LS on hours worked, employees and earnings and LFS are combined for the preparation of final data, with the exception of hours worked in agriculture. Data are prepared separately for employees and self-employed.

The LS was chosen as the main source for data on hours worked by employees (although such data are also available in the LFS) due to better coverage and more reliable NACE breakdown of the survey. Data on hours worked by employees working by other type of contract or without contract are obtained from the LFS. In order to meet the National Accounts general concepts, data on hours worked by employees from LS as well as data from LFS are adjusted in the same way as for employees and self-employed.

For the estimation of hours worked by self-employed in activities C and E, the average number of LFS hours per self-employed person in the activity is used and multiplied by the number of self-employed, derived from the March 2001 Population Census.

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Data on hours worked in agriculture are based on the Farm Structure Survey, conducted by ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. The number of annual working units (AWUS) is multiplied by 1856 (1 AWU = 1856 hours). Specifically for agriculture, quarterly distribution of hours worked by self-employed persons is made according to the estimated quarterly distribution of the number of self-employed persons and their average hours worked provided by LFS.

Employment according to the national accounts

The national accounts procedure for estimating employment has led to an estimated total of 3 229 118 employed persons of whom 7.3 per cent were unregistered (without employment contract) in 2001. Unregistered employment is more widespread among employees in activities like manufacturing, trade, hotels and restaurants. In agriculture, the relevant presence of unregistered employment is related to the seasonal character of the harvest.

Table 1. shows the reconciliation of data from different sources and the final estimates. Table 1. Estimation of total employment and hours worked – 2001

(millions)

NACE _Employees Self-

employed employment Total worked by Hours worked by Hours worked in Hours NA estimates _estimates NA NA estimates _(c1+c2) employees _employed self-

total employment

(c4+c5)

A+B Agriculture, hunting,

forestry and fishing 107.7 676.3 784.0 190.1 1 255.2 1 445.3

C Mining and quarrying 36.4 0.0 36.6 59.6 0.3 60.0

D Manufacturing 614.9 36.9 651.8 1 022.4 67.2 1 089.6

E Electricity, gas and

water supply 61.3 0.0 61.4 103.6 0.2 103.8

F Construction 120.2 11.7 131.9 205.2 19.0 224.2

G Trade 288.0 122.0 410.0 501.1 223.3 724.5

H Hotels and restaurants 90.8 22.7 113.6 158.5 43.7 202.2

I Transport and communications 179.3 18.4 197.7 301.8 32.2 334.0 J Financial intermediation 29.7 1.1 30.7 50.9 2.4 53.3 K Real estate 110.2 18.6 128.7 186.0 33.8 219.8 L Public administration 242.2 0 242.2 441.6 0 441.6 M Education 205.0 1.3 206.3 319.9 1.8 321.7 N Health 136.6 10.0 146.6 223.8 19.5 243.3 O Other community,

social and personal 73.4 13.7 87.1 126.4 19.5 145.9

P Private households with

employed persons 0 00 00 0.8 0 0.8

Total 2 296.2 932.9 3 229.1 3 891.8 1 718.2 5 610.0

Adjustment to value added due to unregistered employment

In order to estimate missing production due to unregistered employment, the number of employed persons used for current GDP calculations (2 968 069) is compared with the standardized employment derived as a result of the project (3 229 118). The analysis of jobs/persons is made at a

very detailed level of economic activity. Jobs are considered to be equal to the persons and FTE for regular employment from the demand side, as the Labour Statistics require the enterprises to report the number of employees as FTE. On the basis of hours worked, LFS data for self-employed, employees with second jobs and employees without labour contract are transformed into FTE. The difference of 121 006, except in the NACE class L (armed forces, security and conscripts) is interpreted as the number of persons employed in the hidden economy. Recalculated in FTE, the number of employed persons decreases by around 17.5 per cent. The activities for which the reconciled employment data exceed the data used in national accounts calculations are trade, manufacturing, hotels and restaurants and agriculture. The adjustment in agriculture is related mostly to an increase of compensation of employees rather than the upward adjustment of the gross output, respectively gross value added, as the output is obtained through commodity by price method.

For estimation of underground activities (where producers are deliberately misreporting) due to the irregular employment, the following steps are taken:

• the employed from the two sources are disaggregated by activities and employees/self-employed are additionally separated by the size of the enterprises:

- enterprises with less than 10 employees; - between 11 and 50 employees; and - more than 50 employees;

• unpaid family workers are regarded as self-employed persons;

• on the base of hours worked, the employed persons are transformed into full time equivalent and full time irregular employment is subsequently derived;

• the estimates of output per unit of labour input and value added per unit of labour input are obtained for registered employment;

• for every activity, by size of the enterprises and number of employees/self- employed, an assumption is made that the ratios of registered and irregular employment are equal;

• estimation of the output/value added per unit of irregular labour is made by applying the ratios from the previous step;

• then estimated gross output/gross value added of irregular employment is integrated into actually measured gross output/gross value added.

The implementation of the labour input method lead to the adjustments of GDP indicated in Table 2.