Part I: Estonian working and entrepreneurship environment Part I of the material provides an overview of Estonian labour market, the legal bases of foreigners to work in Estonia, and Estonian work culture. It describes the taxation system and the most important taxes that employees and entrepreneurs have to know, as well as the possibilities of the
e-Taxation portal. In particular, Estonian health insurance (incl. the matters of compensation for treatment costs and sickness days) and pension system are described. The material also includes information about services available to foreigners (incl. upon job seeking).
1.1 An overview of Estonian labour market According to an Estonian labour force survey (www.stat.ee), there were about 664,700 working people in Estonia in 2018. 35% of them had a higher education, 39% had a vocational education, 10% had a general secondary education, 6% had a secondary specialised education and 10% had a basic or lower education.
As of 2018, 21% of all in employees Estonia were working in the industrial sector (this includes the processing industry, the mining industry as well as the water supply and energy industry). Other large areas of work are wholesale and retail trade (13%), construction and education (both 9%).
Figure 1. Number of employees (thousand) 670
642,5
615
587,5
560
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
Figure 2. Education level of employees 10%
1 41% Tertiary education Secondary, post-secondary or pre-tertiry education Tertiary education
49%
7
