Abstract

Initiative to Exchange Bilateral Data among EU Member States
Eurostat wants to ‘provide accessibility of partner country information (mirror statistics) to all European countries so that they can decide on a voluntary basis how best to use and/or integrate these data in their regular data compilation process (whenever necessary)’ (Eurostat, 2022). In particular, estimating the number of incoming and outgoing non-resident seasonal workers and cross-border commuters by country has been a notorious challenge. The collection of comprehensive and accurate data on the compensation of non-resident employees can form an issue on the credit side, whereas this data is often available on the debit side (Eurostat, 2022). Source differences cause asymmetries in compensation of non-resident seasonal workers and cross-border commuters between EU Member States. In our presentation, we will present how Statistics Netherlands uses new register data (i.e., debit side) to more adequately calculate non-resident worker statistics and the geographical allocation of workers. We will conclude the presentation with recommendations for calculating non-resident worker statistics and potential opportunities for international collaboration.

Method
Statistics Netherlands calculates the amount of income based on register data from the Agency for Employment Insurances (UWV), containing all jobs from employees and their wages, paid hours and other characteristics as well as social security payments. On this micro level the country of residence is derived by combining the integral registry of non-residents (RNI). The RNI records for all non-residents (i.e., never residents and ever residents) with a relationship with the Dutch government where they are living, regardless of nationality. This results in integrated labour accounts compensation of non-resident employees and their geographical location.

Future Directions
International collaboration is particularly relevant to the topic of non-resident seasonal workers and cross-border commuters, as it is a prerequisite to adequately estimate the incoming and outgoing renumeration of non-resident seasonal workers and cross-border commuters by country, and their respective effects on EU Member States economies. This is important to provide a fair and comparable estimate of the GNI per EU Member State.

A first step to improve international collaboration is to gain detailed information on the sources that are being used in each EU Member State. In particular, it is important to facilitate data exchange between EU Member States to reduce gaps in non-resident seasonal workers and cross-border commuters statistics. Ideally, Eurostat could provide a user-friendly platform to improve international collaboration. As a result, data quality will likely improve, allowing Eurostat to more adequately compare one EU Member State with respect to another. Keywords Non-resident seasonal workers, Cross-border commuters, International Collaboration, EU Member States.

References
Eurostat (2022). Compensations of employees and related items (A proposal for exchanging bilateral data). Unit C5 Integrated global accounts and Balance of Payments Item 5.2 of the Agenda ITSS Working Group, 10-11 October 2022 [PowerPoint slides].