Work and employment are not synonyms
Work and employment may be used indistinctly in everyday language, but for the labour market they mean very different things. Employment is a very specific form of work. Other forms of work include own-use production work, volunteer work and unpaid trainee work.
Forms of work: An overview of the new statistical standards
An introduction to the conceptual frameworks for forms of work and labour force statistics, including labour underutilization.
International Classifications of Status in Employment and Status at Work (ICSE and ICSaW)
See the latest international classifications for all forms of work and for employment according to type of authority and economic risk.
Resolution concerning statistics on work relationships
Exploring Light Time-Use approaches for measuring productive activities
The ILO has launched efforts to develop guidance to promote accurate measurement of time use in different settings. A particular focus is the development of a data collection strategy centred on the attachment of a Time-Use module to the LFS. The successful design of such an approach offers many potential advantages given the topic overlap between the LFS and TUS, common target populations, high prevalence of LFS internationally, etc. An in-depth review of methods and country practises has been undertaken to inform the design of such a data collection strategy. This review has focussed in most depth on Light Time-Use Diary (LTUD) approaches to assess their suitability. This Brief highlights results, lessons learned and main challenges identified stemming from that review.
Statistics on unpaid work
This topic page on unpaid work provides access to statistical information including data, methods, publications and more.
National practices in measuring volunteer work: A critical review
This report presents the results of a global review of national practices in measuring volunteer work, between 2007 and 2017, undertaken by the Statistics Department of the ILO. The review was conducted under the framework of the ILO-UN Volunteers (UNV) partnership established to promote and facilitate the regular measurement of volunteer work by the National Statistical Offices.
Care work and care jobs for the future of decent work
This report takes a comprehensive look at unpaid and paid care work and its relationship with the changing world of work. A key focus is the persistent gender inequalities in households and the labour market, which are inextricably linked with care work.
Paid employment vs vulnerable employment
Find out the latest trends in employment by status category and how paid employment compares to vulnerable employment around the world in Paid employment vs vulnerable employment, the third issue of our series Spotlight on Work Statistics.
Resolution concerning statistics of work, employment and labour underutilization (including amendments)
Adopted by the 19th ICLS (2013), this resolution sets standards for work statistics to guide countries in updating and integrating their existing statistical programmes in this field. It defines the statistical concept of work for reference purposes and provides operational concepts, definitions and guidelines for: (a) distinct subsets of work activities, referred to as forms of work; (b) related classifications of the population according to their labour force status and main form of work; (c) measures of labour underutilization.