In the first quarter of 2012, the total hourly labor cost in Bulgaria rose by 6.2% compared to the first quarter of 2011.

These flash figures were released Monday by the Bulgarian National Statistics Institute, NSI.

The total hourly labor cost grew by 4.2% in the industrial sector, by 9.5% in the services one, and by 0.4% in construction.

The breakdown by economic activities shows that the highest annual growths in total labor costs were recorded in 'Other Service Activities' - 17.1%, in 'Administrative and Support Service Activities' - 14.6% and 'Information and Communication' - 14.4%, while the lowest annual growths were registered in 'Construction' and 'Human Health and Social Work Activities' respectively 0.4% and 1.8%. Decrease in total labor costs was observed in 'Real Estate Activities' by 1.0% and 'Arts, Entertainment and Recreation' by 0.8%.

The two main components of labor costs are wages & salaries and non-wage costs.

In the structure of the total labor costs, wages and salaries costs per hour worked grew by 7.1% in comparison with the same period of 2011, while the other (non-wage) costs rose by 2.0%. Among the economic activities in the first quarter of 2012, compared to the first quarter of 2011, the growth rate of wages and salaries component ranged from (-0.7%) in 'Real Estate Activities' to 18.9% in 'Other Service Activities'.