Germany gross wages index, service activities
Germany gross wages index, service activities stood at 124.39 in Q2 2026, according to Deutsche Bundesbank. It is one of the indicators in the Labour cost index table (Value · Quarterly), with a complete series running from Q1 1996 to Q2 2026. The complete series with an interactive chart, free to download.
This indicator in the Labour cost index table
| Indicator | Q2-2026 | Q1-2026 | Q4-2025 | Q3-2025 | Q2-2025 | Q1-2025 | Q4-2024 | Q3-2024 | Q2-2024 | Q1-2024 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Section G-S - Service activities2 | 124.39 | 122.91 | 121.33 | 120.38 | 121.03 | 119.02 | 116.23 | 115.33 | 115.43 | 114.49 | |
| Section G-N - Market-based service activities | 127.73 | 126.21 | 123.5 | 122.6 | 124.53 | 122.64 | 119.36 | 118.51 | 117.67 | 117.39 | |
| Section O-S - Non-market service activities | 119.86 | 118.42 | 118.37 | 117.37 | 116.26 | 114.07 | 111.96 | 111 | 112.39 | 110.55 |
Understanding germany gross wages index, service activities
The metric quantifies the direct pre-tax earnings disbursed to workers across tertiary industries, excluding both production-oriented businesses and primary sectors. It encompasses basic pay, regular bonuses, and allowances for employees engaged in sections G through S, which spans retail, transport, finance, and public administration. Unlike the broader aggregates, this index strips out any non-wage overheads like employer social contributions or training expenses, strictly tracking the cash remuneration tied to an hour of labour in the service sector. By discarding the manufacturing and construction figures found in parallel rows, the measure provides a targeted view of the take-home pay structures unique to service-based occupations, which often display different shift patterns and bonus conventions compared to industrial work.
Reading this index requires attention to seasonal pay distributions, particularly the concentration of vacation allowances and end-of-year bonuses that can create quarterly spikes. Analysts prefer year-on-year comparisons to smooth out these recurrent calendar effects and observe the underlying path of service-sector pay. Revisions often occur when late survey returns from smaller service enterprises are incorporated into the final dataset. Users should note that periodic rebasing, currently set to 2020=100, can introduce methodological breaks or re-weightings within the sub-sectors, adjusting how heavily specific services influence the total. Comparing this gross wage index against the full labour cost equivalent reveals the fluctuating wedge of statutory and voluntary employer contributions within the tertiary economy.
Frequently asked questions
- Does this index include employer pension contributions?
- No, it strictly covers gross wages and salaries, omitting any non-wage labour costs such as employer social contributions.
- Are self-employed service providers tracked in this series?
- The index relies on payroll data, meaning it only counts compensation for dependent employees rather than the earnings of freelancers or sole proprietors.
- Why might this series diverge from the private sector wage index?
- This specific cut includes non-market service activities, such as public administration and state education, which are entirely excluded from the private sector metric.