Eurostat (Statistical Office of the EU)

Official statistics for the European Union and euro area — the counterpart to Hagstofan for evrusvæðið. No authentication, no rate key, plain HTTP.

API

Base URL: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/api/dissemination/statistics/1.0/data/{dataset}

• JSON via ?format=JSON; filters as &dim=code params.
• Responses are json-stat2: .dimension.<d>.category.index maps code → position, .label position → human label, .value holds row-major composite-indexed values (first dimension varies fastest).
• No API key. Works from any CI runner (unlike geo-fenced Icelandic hosts).

scripts/eurostat.py wraps this: fetch DATASET --filter KEY=VALUE (repeatable) flattens to a tidy long CSV in data/processed/eurostat/ (--out overrides).

Fetching data

uv run python scripts/eurostat.py list                    # curated datasets
uv run python scripts/eurostat.py fetch prc_hicp_midx \
  --filter geo=EA20 --filter coicop=CP00 --filter unit=I15
uv run python scripts/eurostat.py fetch namq_10_a10 \
  --filter geo=EA20 --filter na_item=D1 --filter s_adj=SCA \
  --filter unit=CP_MEUR --filter nace_r2=TOTAL
uv run python scripts/eurostat.py fetch namq_10_pe \
  --filter geo=EA20 --filter na_item=EMP_DC --filter s_adj=SCA --filter unit=THS_PER

Filter values are codes, case-insensitive. The time dimension cannot be range-filtered server-side (400) — fetch the series and slice locally (duckdb/polars).

Key datasets used in this repo

Dataset	What	Key codes
prc_hicp_midx	HICP monthly index	unit=I15 (2015=100), coicop=CP00 (all items)
prc_hicp_manr	HICP monthly rate of change	unit=RCH_A (annual), RCH_M (monthly)
namq_10_a10	National accounts, quarterly	na_item=D1 (compensation of employees, CP_MEUR), D11 (wages & salaries), s_adj=SCA, nace_r2=TOTAL
namq_10_pe	Population & employment, quarterly	na_item=EMP_DC (employment, THS_PER), s_adj=SCA
lc_lci_lev	Labour cost levels, annual	lcstruct=D11 (wages & salaries, €/h), nace_r2=B-S_X_O
namq_10_lp_ulc	Productivity & unit labour costs	na_item=RLPR_*, NULC_*

Real wages, euro area (the canonical recipe)

Real compensation per employee, quarterly, 2015=100:

-- data/processed/eurostat/{namq_10_a10,namq_10_pe,prc_hicp_midx}.csv fetched per above
WITH ea AS (
  SELECT make_date(CAST(regexp_extract(time,'(\\d{4})',1) AS INT),
                   1+3*(CAST(regexp_extract(time,'Q(\\d)',1) AS INT)-1), 1) q, value d1
  FROM read_csv_auto('data/processed/eurostat/namq_10_a10.csv')),
emp AS (
  SELECT make_date(CAST(regexp_extract(time,'(\\d{4})',1) AS INT),
                   1+3*(CAST(regexp_extract(time,'Q(\\d)',1) AS INT)-1), 1) q, value e
  FROM read_csv_auto('data/processed/eurostat/namq_10_pe.csv')),
hicp AS (
  SELECT date_trunc('quarter', strptime(time,'%Y-%m')) q, avg(value) h
  FROM read_csv_auto('data/processed/eurostat/prc_hicp_midx.csv') GROUP BY 1)
SELECT ea.q, 100.0*(d1/e*1000/h)/
       (SELECT avg(d1/e*1000/h) FROM ea JOIN emp USING(q) JOIN hicp USING(q)
        WHERE ea.q BETWEEN date '2015-01-01' AND date '2015-12-31') idx2015
FROM ea JOIN emp USING(q) JOIN hicp USING(q) WHERE ea.q >= date '2015-01-01';

reports/real_wages_is_vs_euro.py is the worked example — it builds the Iceland-vs-euro-area real wage comparison chart.

Caveats

1. Codes change / datasets move. LC_LCI_R2 (quarterly LCI) is not available for dissemination (404) — use namq_10_a10/namq_10_pe instead. An invalid filter returns 200 with value: {} — check for empty values, not just HTTP status.
2. lc_lci_lev is benchmark-year based for EA20: 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020-2025 only. Don't assume continuous annual series.
3. json-stat indexes are 0-based positions, and .category.label is keyed by position — the label for position 0 is a valid lookup; don't index labels by code.
4. EA20 includes Croatia (from 2023) — negligible for aggregates.
5. Seasonally adjusted (SCA) employment/compensation vs non-adjusted HICP is the standard real-wage mix; HICP has almost no seasonality.