30. 11. 95 Official Journal of the European Communities No L 287/3 COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 2744/95 of 27 November 1995 on statistics on the structure and distribution of earnings THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, and in particular Article 213 thereof, Having regard to the proposal from the Commission, Whereas, in order to carry out the tasks assigned to it, the Commission must be kept informed of the position and trend of earnings in the Member States of the Commu- nity with regard, on the one hand, to their variations in terms of the structure of the labour force and, on the other hand, to the distribution of employees according to earnings level; Whereas the development of the Community and the operation of the internal market increase the need for comparable data on the structure of earnings, particularly as a means of analysing the progress of economic and social cohesion and for establishing reliable comparisons between the Member States and the regions of the Community ; Whereas the best method of assessing the situation as regards the structure and distribution of earnings is to produce Community statistics of the structure of earnings using harmonized methods and definitions, as was done in 1966, 1972, 1974 and 1978 pursuant to Regulations No 188/64/EEC (), (EEC) No 2395/71(), (EEC) No 178/74 (%), and (EEC) No 495/78 (*) respectively ; Whereas, owing to the changes which occur in the struc- ture of the labour force and in the distribution of earnings, particularly as regards economic activities, the results of the earlier surveys are no longer up to date and do not cover all the Member States ; Whereas the data currently available for the Member States as a whole supply only averages and are not there- fore likely to provide any indication either of the relation- ship between earnings and the individual characteristics of wage earners (particularly ‘age, sex, professional status, length of service) or of the spread of earnings; Whereas statistical information in this field is available only in certain Member States and valid comparisons cannot therefore be made ; whereas the statistics of the structure of earnings must consequently be carried out on () OJ No 214, 24. 12. 1964, p. 3634/64. () OJ No L 249, 10. 11. 1971, p. 52. () OJ No L 21, 25. 1. 1974, p. 2. () OJ No L 68, 10. 3. 1978, p. 3. the basis of common definitions and harmonized metho- dologies ; Whereas, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity, the creation of common statistical standards enabling harmonized information to be produced is action which can be effectively undertaken only at Community level ; whereas these standards will be implemented in each Member State on the authority of the agencies and insti- tutions appointed to compile official statistics ; Whereas, pursuant to Decision 93/464/EEC (), the production of Community statistics on the structure of earnings is one of the priority actions in the Statistical Programme 1993 to 1997 ; Whereas it seems appropriate to make provisions for exceptions for certain Member States, in order to take account of particular technical difficulties encountered by such States in the collection of certain types of informa- tion, provided that the quality of the statistical informa- tion is not affected ; Whereas the Statistical Programme Committee esta- blished by Decision 89/382/EEC, Euratom (f), has reached a favourable conclusion on the Commission proposal, HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION : Article 1 General provisions The Member States and the Commission, within their respective fields of competences, shall produce Commu- nity statistics on the structure and distribution of all employees’ earnings in the sections of economic activities defined in Article 3. Article 2 Reference period The statistics shall be produced on the basis of statistical information for the financial year of 1995 and for a corresponding representative month, subject to the special provisions mentioned in the Annex. OJ No L 219, 28. 8. 1993, p. 1. (9 OJ No L 181, 28. 6. 1989, p. 47.