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Tomorrow's March SEPH day! SEPH is StatCan’s employer-focused counterpart to the LFS, which will cover payrolls for the last week of March, when the shut-down was well underway.
Here are 3 things I’ll be looking out for, that we don’t get in the LFS data: (1/8)
Here are 3 things I’ll be looking out for, that we don’t get in the LFS data: (1/8)
1. Industry detail - SEPH’s job counts are based on the employee T4’s of ALL active Canadian businesses - as a result it provides way more detail on industries than the LFS, which in the public data combines some pretty large categories. (2/8) https://twitter.com/BrendonBernard_/status/1264917694622679046?s=20
Some industry breakdowns I’ll be watching: within retail, how do essential stores hold up vs non-essential.
Hospital vs. clinics, vs. the dentist offices, have likely fared differently within healthcare, while professional services include a wide range of sectors! (3/8)
Hospital vs. clinics, vs. the dentist offices, have likely fared differently within healthcare, while professional services include a wide range of sectors! (3/8)
2. Weekly earnings (avg & aggregate).
The LFS has some problems in assessing how paychecks have changed in this crisis - in contrast, SEPH directly tracks employee pay received during the reference week - this’ll help give a sense of how much labour income has been lost. (4/8)
The LFS has some problems in assessing how paychecks have changed in this crisis - in contrast, SEPH directly tracks employee pay received during the reference week - this’ll help give a sense of how much labour income has been lost. (4/8)
3. Fixed weight hourly earnings - one of the issues with following LFS wage growth is it’s influenced by the changing job mix - with lower paid roles hit hardest, hourly wages are actually up sharply! (5/8) https://twitter.com/BrendonBernard_/status/1260638800893616130?s=20
SEPH’s fixed-weight earnings index helps deal with some of these compositional changes by removing the impacts of shifts across provinces, industries, and hourly/salaried workers. If the crisis has affected wages (as some surveys suggest), it might show up here (6/8)
OK so that's a bunch of stuff to follow tomorrow morning!
Now here are a few caveats to consider:
1. SEPH doesn't track the self-employed
2. Hours = hours *paid for - if a salaried employee doesn't work, but still gets their usual paycheck, SEPH records their usual hours (7/8)
Now here are a few caveats to consider:
1. SEPH doesn't track the self-employed
2. Hours = hours *paid for - if a salaried employee doesn't work, but still gets their usual paycheck, SEPH records their usual hours (7/8)
3. Lastly, since a employment in SEPH is based on employer payrolls, there could be hourly workers who didn't work during the week that might respond to the LFS that they were employed, but won't be counted as such in SEPH - something to consider when comparing the #'s! (8/8)
