Puerto Rico

Organization responsible for the statistics

The statistics are collected and compiled by the Police Department. The Bureau of Conciliation and Arbitration provides monthly and daily reports to the Secretary of the Department of Labor and Human Resources.

Objectives and users

Not available.

Coverage

Strikes and lockouts

The statistics cover:

Sympathetic strikes, political or protest strikes and general strikes are not covered.

Minimum threshold None.

Economic activities

No particular branches of economic activity are excluded.

Workers

Workers involved directly and workers involved indirectly. In addition to regular paid employees, including part-time workers, the statistics cover temporary, casual and seasonal workers. Unpaid family workers and workers laid off are not covered.

No particular occupational groups are excluded.

Geographic areas

Whole country.

Types of data collected

Concepts and definitions

Strike

A work stoppage by organized workers.

Lockout

A closing of facilities by the employer in order to leave out organized workers from those facilities.

These are working definitions for statistical purposes.

Methods of measurement

Strikes and lockouts

The basic unit of measurement used to record a strike or lockout is the economic unit. If a work stoppage is interrupted but later resumes, still due to the same case of dispute, it is considered as a new strike or lockout when it recommences.

Work stoppages due to the same case of dispute occurring simultaneously in different establishments of the same enterprise are counted as one strike or lockout. Those due to the same case of dispute occurring simultaneously in establishments of different enterprises are treated as different strikes or lockouts. Work stoppages due to the same case of dispute occurring at different times in different establishments of the same or different enterprises are treated as different strikes or lockouts.

Economic units involved

The economic unit is the firm together with the workers' bargaining unit, defined as a firm with a specific unit of organized workers if they are organized as such to bargain collectively, or any firm with non-organized workers who act collectively in a concerted way.

Workers involved

The number of workers involved is the highest number of workers involved at any one moment during the strike or lockout. Part-time workers are counted as individuals on the same basis as full-time workers.

Duration

The duration is measured in workdays, from the date the strike or lockout began to the date it ended in the particular firm.

Time not worked

The amount of time not worked, in workdays, is the product of the number of workers involved and the duration. The shorter working hours of part-time workers and overtime are not taken into account in the estimate.

Classifications

Branch of economic activity

The data are classified according to branch of economic activity.

Other

Reference period and periodicity

The statistics are compiled for periods of a quarter and a year. They relate to strikes and lockouts ending during the reference period.

Analytical measures

None.

Historical background of the series

Not available.

Documentation

Series available

Not available.

Bibliogrpahic references

None.

Data published by the ILO

The number of strikes and lockouts, the number of workers involved and the number of days not worked, by economic activity.

Confidentiality

Not available.

International standards

Not available.

Methods of data collection

There is a legal obligation to report the occurrence of a strike. For the strike to be legal, the trade union must give notice, a specific period in advance, to the Bureau of Conciliation and Arbitration, informing it that a dispute exists concerning the negotiation of a bargaining agreement. A standard form is used for this purpose. For other types of strike and for lockouts, information is only collected if the Bureau of Conciliation and Arbitration participates in its solution. The Police Department receives information regarding all types of strike.