The structure of Spain's labour market

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present a discussion of the structure of the labour market is Spain, based both on the official labour force statistics as well as on a specific survey whose aim was, among others, to investigate in a more profound way, so me of the structural aspects of the operation of the Spanish labour market. The paper is thus divided in two sections. Section II presents the data coming from the official labour force sample survey (EPA). We present a series of data on the structure of Spain's labour market by sex and gender, industry, and occupation. In each case, we compare the figures corresponding to 1976 to those of a decade later. In particular, we investigate the issue of the increasing importance of female employment, trying to explain this evolution by means of a shift-share analysis. On the other hand, Section III presents the results of a special sample survey aimed at ascertaining some of the structural aspects of the Spanish labour market, including the size and composition of the "underground" economy. We shall present an analysis of labour market segmentation based on the results of this survey.