The composition of the workforce according to education and age is an
important determinant of the labour force participation rate. Education and
age of the working-agepopulation determine the level of economic activity
through specific activity rates (direct effect) and through the numerical
distribution of the population according to educational and age categories
(indirect effect). The nature of the basic relationship between demographic
structures and the level of activity is already well known and explained,
but in previous works in which changes in the level of economic activity
were investigated, there is a lack of analyses that would break down the
difference in the value of the general rate of activity of the labour
contingent into the contribution of the components that participate in that
change, which would create space for public policies and the implementation
of measures aimed at expanding the scope of the workforce. Therefore, this
scientific paper quantifies the indirect (composite) and direct
(behavioural) effects of the educational and age structure of the workforce
during the period 2002-2021. It is assumed that for oscillations in the
level of activity there was a more significant contribution of behavioural
effects, that is, compared to composite effects, they had a stronger
influence both when the labour force participation rate was falling
(2002-2011) and when it was growing (2011-2021). The analysis is based on
data from the Labour Force Survey, and the method of decomposition of
general rates, often used in demography, was used to quantify the individual
contribution of effects.