Both wages and other costs, including various social contributions paid by employers, were down by 5.9% in Slovenia, according to Eurostat data released on Monday.

In the eurozone, costs of wages per hour were up by 1.1%, while the other costs increased by 0.1%. In the entire EU, these figures stood at 1% and 0.3%, respectively.

Slovenia, which recorded the biggest drop, was followed by Cyprus (-4.6%), Croatia (-0.6%) and Spain (-0.3%). The biggest increase was meanwhile recorded in Estonia (+7.7%), Lithuania (+6.5%) and Romania (+6%).