Salary
IDA's salary forecast 2024
Every year, IDA publishes a forecast for the salary development for privately employed members. You can see the salary forecast for 2024 here.
IDA's salary forecast for 2024 shows that, on average, it is realistic for privately employed members of IDA to achieve a salary increase of 7 per cent in 2024.
The most important parameter for salary development is supply and demand. Historically, statistics on pay development show a clear connection between low salary increases and high unemployment and vice versa.
This picture was very clearly confirmed in 2023, when IDA members received the highest real salary increase in many years. This year's salary development thus resulted in a significant recovery of the real salary compared to 2022.
According to an analysis prepared by IRIS Group and HBS Economics for IDA, in 2030 there will be a shortage of 13,000 educated candidates in the STEM fields.
With this in mind, it's safe to assume that the demand for IDA's members' labour is persistently high, even though unemployment is expected to increase slightly for the entire labour market in 2024.
How IDA makes the salary forecast
The salary development for privately employed IDA members has been prepared on the basis of the following factors:
- The average of the past three years' salary development according to IDA's Salary Statistics.
- The Economic Council's (DØR) figures on salary developments in the labour market over the past three years and the expectations for the coming year.
- Statistics Denmark assessment of inflation for the past three years and the Economic Council's expectations for inflation in the coming year.
- The average of recent years' salary development according to Danish Industry's Salary Statistics for Engineers.
- The unemployment rate for engineers etc.
Salary development 2021-2023 - forecast for 2024
| 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | |
| Average salary increase (Source: IDA's salary statistics) | 4.3% | 5.1% | 6.5% | 7.0% (Forecast) |
| Salary development (Source: DØR) | 2.6% | 3.5% | 4.5% (Forecast) | 5.9% (Forecast) |
| Inflation (Sources: Statistics Denmark and DØR) | 3.1% | 8.7% | 3.3% | 2.6% (Forecast) |
| Average salary development for engineers (Source: Danish Industry) | 3.0% | 4.0% | 5.0% | ? |
Over 80 per cent of the salary adjustments are made in the period from January to August. This means that the statistics largely show the salary increase in the year.
The figures for inflation in the table follow the calendar year.
The forecasts regarding salary development and inflation in the table come from DØR's report on the Danish economy published in the autumn 2023. DØR consists of a chairmanship of four independent economists. The members of DØR are representatives of the social partners, the Danish National Bank, the government and interest organisations.
Unemployment 2021-2023
To make the salary forecast, IDA has also looked at unemployment.
In November 2023, the unemployment rate for engineers was 1.7%, while it was 4.5% for MScs. For "everyone" relevant, the unemployment rate is 2.5%.
Compared to the previous years, there is thus another decrease in total unemployment for both groups, and the level is extremely low and somewhat below the unemployment figures before Corona.
The unemployment rate for the whole group of engineers was 1.7% in November 2022, while it was 5.2% for MScs. The figure for "everyone" was 2.7%
In November 2021, we saw an unemployment rate of 2.3% for engineers, 6.8% for MScs and 3.4% for "all" relevant groups.