Monthly employee index rises marginally in March

The seasonally adjusted annual employee index rose by 1.5% to March 2025

The largest monthly rise by economic sector was in administrative and support services, which grew by 0.5% in March. Photographer: Patrick Bolger/Bloomberg generic stock street shoppers

The monthly employee index rose by 0.1% in March, new figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) show.

The monthly employee index for males fell marginally in March, falling by 0.2%, while the employee index for females was down by 0.1% in the same period. 

On an annual basis, the index for females increased by 1.3%, and for males was up by 1.9%.

The seasonally adjusted annual employee index rose by 1.5% to March, the CSO added.

Taking age into account, the largest monthly increase was observed in the 60-64 years age category, which grew by 0.3% in the month. Meanwhile, the largest monthly decrease was in the 15-19 years age group, which fell by 1.2%.

The largest monthly rise by economic sector was in administrative and support services, which grew by 0.5% in March. 

"Five NACE sectors saw a monthly increase in the numbers employed in March 2025, one was unchanged, while nine sectors showed a decrease," said CSO statistician Aoife McHugh. 

Employment in accommodation and food services activities fell by 1.4%, while transportation and storage dropped by 0.6%. 

All other sectors observed increases in the annual index, with the largest changes in construction, up 4.4%, industry, which grew by 3.8% and human health and social work activities, up 3.5%.

The sector that observed the largest monthly fall was services, which fell by 2.2%.

It should be noted that this is the smallest sector, with 4,400 employees in March 2025, Ms McHugh added. 

Some 2.53m people were employed in March, the CSO said, which was up 1.5% compared to the same month last year.