1% Weekly Wage Decrease For Average Irish Builder

Average weekly earnings for Irish builders fell by one per cent in the 12 months leading to September, the Central Statistics Office has revealed.

The figure represents around €8.50 less pay per week.

Despite hourly rates increasing by one percent, the earning potential of builders dropped due to reduced working hours, which fell by around 2% to 43.2 hours per week.


Unskilled adult workers' weekly pay fell by 2.4% on average, during the year proceeding September. This brought the average weekly wage to €808.80.

Hourly rates per hour creped up by 4cent, bringing average hourly labour costs to €17.49.

The figures also show that the numbers of hours worked each week decreased from 47.2 to 46.0.

Skilled operatives saw their weekly earnings decrease by 2.3% from €922.98 to €901.47 over the same period.

The hourly rate rose from €20.64 to €20.76 and the number of hours worked each week decreased from 44.7 to 43.4.

The CSO's figures come amid predictions of a loss of a further 30,000 construction jobs next year.

(PR/JM)