« Previous | Contents | Next »
Listen
SCOTLAND'S SOCIAL CARE LABOUR MARKET
SUMMARY
Appendix I
Glossary
Aggregate Sector: The sector analysed at the national level as opposed to the regional, or individual case.
95% Confidence Interval: The range around a sample-based statistic for which the actual figure is likely to fall in with 95% certainty.
Dependency Ratio: The ratio of working-age population to non-working age population.
Economic Activity Rate: The proportion of the working-age population that is either working or registered as "actively" looking for employment. The inactive refer to people who want a job but have not been seeking work in the past four weeks; those who want a job and are seeking but are not available to start; and those who do not want a job. This is based on the International Labour Organisation definition.
Economies of Scale: The theory that as output, or for example the number of service users in a specific unit increases, the average costs per service user drops.
Expansion Demand: Demand for new staff that stems from expansion of services or numbers of service users. This does not include demand that stems from the need to replace workers who leave the sector for retirement or other reasons.
Independent Sector: A term used within the Labour Force Survey which includes the private and voluntary sectors combined.
Informal Sector: Provision of care that is provided by family/friends who are not paid and therefore not represented in official employment statistics.
Policy "Adjustment Impacts": Legislative change that will increase or decrease service demand and/or workforce demand.
Replacement Demand: Demand for new staff to replace those that leave the sector. If only replacement demand is met then the overall level of employment would remain stable and would not actually increase.
Service User Ratio: The proportion of the relevant population that is a particular type of service user of social care.
Social Care: A broad definition of the sector which includes social work services and early years and childcare employment in public, private and voluntary sectors unless specified otherwise in the report.
Social Work Activities: Standard Industrial Classification used by LFS. Broadly comparable with social care definition.
Whole Time Equivalent (WTE): Used in local authority statistics and represents the number of full-time equivalent posts as opposed to the actual number of employees.
« Previous | Contents | Next »