Wednesday, 7 January 2026
Poland’s Labour Force Survey (LFS) data, published at the end of December 2025, provide a seasonally adjusted overview of labour market developments from the first quarter of 2010 through the third quarter of 2025. The figures are released on a quarterly basis and cover the population living in private households across the country.
The survey tracks the working-age population by distinguishing between people who are working, those seeking work, and those remaining outside the labour market. Individuals counted as working include people aged 15 to 89 who carried out paid or income-generating activity during the reference week, even if only for a limited number of hours. This group also includes those temporarily absent from work due to reasons such as illness, holidays, training, parental responsibilities or seasonal interruptions, provided their link to a job or business was maintained. Apprentices receiving remuneration are also included, while unpaid volunteers and subsistence farmers producing mainly for their own use are excluded.
Workers are further classified by their role in employment, separating employees, people running their own businesses, employers who hire staff, self-employed individuals without employees, and family members who assist in a business without formal pay. Those without work are counted as unemployed only if they were actively searching for a job and available to start work within a short period. The unemployed group is divided into categories reflecting whether a person recently lost a job, left work voluntarily, returned to job searching after a break, or is seeking work for the first time.
People who do not meet the criteria for either work or unemployment are treated as outside the labour force. This includes those who are not seeking employment, those whose job search is not active, or those who have found a job but cannot begin within the defined time frame.
Using these groupings, the survey calculates key indicators such as participation in the labour market, the share of the population in work, and the proportion of jobseekers among those who are economically active. To ensure comparability over time, the data are adjusted to remove regular seasonal fluctuations through a standard statistical procedure.
In recent years, methodological updates have been introduced to reflect changes in legal frameworks and data needs. Since 2021, definitions and questionnaires have been revised, including the formal introduction of an upper age limit for detailed labour market analysis and broader inclusion of certain unpaid family workers and people on parental leave. At the same time, some categories, such as self-employed individuals in small-scale private farming for own consumption, have been removed from the employed population.
Population weights used to produce national totals have also been updated. From late 2023 onward, the survey results have been aligned with demographic data derived from the 2021 population census, with historical figures revised accordingly to maintain consistency.
Together, the long time series and updated methodology offer a comprehensive picture of how employment, unemployment and labour market participation in Poland have evolved over the past fifteen years, while also highlighting the impact of definitional and statistical changes on labour market measurement.
