German main construction industry wages and salaries
German main construction industry wages and salaries stood at 2,474,852 EUR thousand in Jul 2026, according to Deutsche Bundesbank and Statistisches Bundesamt (Destatis). It is one of the indicators in the Construction activity table (Value · Monthly), with a complete series running from Mar 2017 to Jul 2026. The complete series with an interactive chart, free to download.
This indicator in the Construction activity table
| Indicator | 07-2026 | 06-2026 | 05-2026 | 04-2026 | 03-2026 | 02-2026 | 01-2026 | 12-2025 | 11-2025 | 10-2025 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Main construction industry (Destatis) | |||||||||||
| Wages and salaries | 2,474,852 | 2,418,148 | 2,304,278 | 2,445,408 | 2,173,602 | 1,850,962 | 1,897,905 | 2,249,628 | 2,766,889 | 2,300,416 | |
| Hours worked | 58,458 | 57,257 | 50,341 | 56,014 | 56,126 | 39,050 | 32,217 | 40,989 | 53,960 | 57,612 |
Understanding german main construction industry wages and salaries
Gross financial remuneration distributed to the workforce of the primary building sector forms the entirety of this monetary aggregate. The scope captures base pay, overtime premiums, and regular bonuses disbursed to both site operators and administrative personnel employed by structural and civil engineering firms. It deliberately excludes employer contributions to social security, severance packages, and payments funneled to external freelance subcontractors. While sibling metrics tally the raw number of individuals on the payroll, this specific gauge tracks the actual financial compensation flowing to those workers, directly reflecting the prevailing labor costs shouldered by the industry.
Evaluating the sectoral wage bill demands careful attention to annual collective bargaining agreements, which regularly trigger sudden, permanent step-changes in the aggregate. Furthermore, heavy seasonal effects driven by winter site closures make year-on-year assessments necessary for accurate trend analysis, as period-on-period comparisons merely reflect predictable weather disruptions rather than underlying labor market tightness. Analysts frequently divide these gross remuneration figures by total hours worked to extract an implied hourly labor cost. Users must remember that variations in the ratio of highly paid civil engineers to baseline manual laborers will naturally shift the total without reflecting changes in general wage rates.
Frequently asked questions
- Are employer social security contributions part of these figures?
- The scope is strictly confined to gross wages and salaries paid directly to employees, excluding mandatory employer-side social charges.
- Does this cover payments made to external independent contractors?
- Remuneration is only tracked for formal payroll employees, completely discarding invoices settled with freelance or external specialized trades.
- How do union negotiations affect the historical data?
- Newly implemented collective bargaining agreements frequently create distinct, permanent upward shifts in the aggregate compensation series.