MADRID, 16 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The average labor cost per worker and month (which includes salaries and social security contributions) rose 4% in the third quarter of the year compared to the same period in 2021, to stand at 2,754.75 euros.

With this increase in labor cost, two tenths higher than the previous quarter, there are already seven consecutive quarters of increases, the National Statistics Institute (INE) reported this Friday.

Labor cost is made up of wage cost and other costs. In the third quarter, wages (all remunerations, both in cash and in kind) rose by 4.1% year-on-year in gross terms, reaching an average of 2,032.05 euros per worker and month, the highest figure in a third quarter since the beginning of the series, in the year 2000.

By activity, the hospitality industry led the increase in wages in the third quarter, with a year-on-year increase of 15.4%, reaching 1,314.59 euros per month per worker. The interannual growth of wages in the hospitality industry has moderated by almost 25 points compared to the second quarter, when it increased by 40.3%.

The INE has also reported that in the third quarter of the year 143,876 job vacancies were registered, understanding a vacancy as a job position recently created or that is not occupied or that is about to become free and for which the employer is taking active measures to find a candidate from outside the company.

94.5% of the companies asked by Statistics answered that they had no vacancies to fill between July and September because they did not need additional workers. Most of the vacancies, nine out of ten, are in the service sector.