Pay & work

Minimum wages and who actually works

Two different questions, from two official sources. What is the legal floor on pay, and how many people are in work at all — which turns out to vary far more between countries than unemployment headlines suggest.

Who is in the labour force

Labour force participation rate

The share of everyone aged 15 and over who is either working or actively looking for work. It is not the opposite of unemployment: a country can have low unemployment and low participation at the same time if large numbers of people have stopped looking altogether, are studying, or are caring for family full time.

Measured in % of population aged 15+. Source: World Bank Open Data (indicator code SL.TLF.CACT.ZS, CC BY 4.0). Latest year available: 2025. How this is sourced

Snapshot refreshed 17 Oct 2026, 20:27 UTC. Country histories are fetched live when you select a country.

Statutory minimum wage

Gross monthly minimum wage, in euro, for countries that set one in law.

Source: Eurostat (dataset earn_mw_cur, Eurostat open data policy (reuse permitted with attribution)), period 2026-S2. How this is sourced

Countries with no national minimum wage in law are genuinely absent here rather than shown as zero. In Austria, Italy, Denmark, Finland and Sweden, pay floors are set by collective agreement between unions and employers instead of by statute — often resulting in higher effective minimums than the legal ones listed below.