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Comparability

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National Accounts, Economic Statistics
Martin Brandstrup
+45 23 80 57 50

brn@dst.dk

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Employment and Compensation of Employees in National Accounts

It is a fundamental imperative that national accounts to the largest possible extent are comparable over time. This means e.g. that new sources always have to be adapted to the concepts of the national accounts, and that changes of existing sources cannot be seen directly as changes of variables and concepts in the national accounts statistics. The quarterly national accounts are consistent with the annual national accounts. Internationally there is a high degree of comparability with the national accounts of other countries because the Danish national accounts are compiled in accordance with the definitions in the European System of National Accounts ESA2010.

Comparability - geographical

Internationally, there exists a high degree of comparability with the national accounts of other countries, since the Danish national accounts are compiled in accordance with the definitions in the European System of National Accounts (ESA2010).

Comparability over time

It is a fundamental imperative that national accounts to the largest possible extent are comparable over time. This means e.g. that new sources always have to be adapted to the concepts of the national accounts, and that changes of existing sources cannot be seen directly as changes of variables and concepts in the national accounts statistics.

However, fundamental changes of nomenclatures, e.g. industrial classification or consumption classification, invariably result in changes in the national accounts, as was the case recently with the introduction of Statistics Denmark's latest industrial classification DB07.

Coherence - cross domain

Statistics Denmark's industrial classification 2007 (DB07), which is a Danish version of the EU NACE, rev. 2. and the UN's ISIC, rev. 4, contains a number of standard classifications: the 127, 36, 19, and 10 classifications.

The final national accounts classification of 117 industries corresponds (with few deviations) to the 127 standard classification, and the 117 industries of the national accounts can be aggregated to the other standard classifications. For this reason, national accounts figures can easily be compared to and used in connection with other statistics that are based on the DB07-standard classifications.

However, comparisons with other statistics at a detailed industry level will often show differences, partly because of differences in definitions of variables, and partly because of the calendar year delimitation of the national accounts and its requirement of total coverage of the economic activity.

The quarterly national accounts are consistent with the annual national accounts.

Compensation of Employees can be found for example in StatBank tables NAHO2 and NKHO2.

Internationally there is a high degree of comparability with the national accounts of other countries because the Danish national accounts are compiled in accordance with the definitions in the European System of National Accounts ESA2010.

Coherence - internal

By definition, there is complete internal consistency in national accounts.