In 2020, there was a marked year-on-year increase in unit labour costs in the manufacturing sector of 6.0 percent. Austria's
unit labour cost position deteriorated both relative to the weighted average of all its trading partners (+1.7 percentage
points) and relative to its EU trading partners (+1.5 percentage points). Despite this overall development, the unit labour
cost position relative to Germany, Austria's most important trading partner (+0.1 percentage point) is largely unaltered.
Due to differences in policy design and implementation of the COVID-19 aid measures (especially with regard to short-time
work) across countries as well as the statistical treatment of these measures in the Quarterly National Accounts, the data
underlying our calculations for 2020 are distorted and comparability across countries is limited.
JEL-Codes:F16, F31, J3, L6
Keywords:Unit labour costs, price competitiveness, manufacturing
Forschungsbereich:Arbeitsmarktökonomie, Einkommen und soziale Sicherheit – Industrie-, Innovations- und internationale Ökonomie