Productivity and Labor Costs Compete with Unemployment
The report on second-quarter productivity and unit labor costs is out from the Labor Department after last week’s surprise nonfarm payrolls gains. Productivity (hourly output) rose by 1.6% versus -0.5% in the first quarter, and that was higher than the…
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Expectations from Bloomberg were +1.3% on the productivity measure and +0.9% on the unit labor cost measurement. Hourly compensation grew at a faster rate than productivity. Has America milked the last ounce of productivity per cost? While the United States added 163,000 in last week’s jobs report in the second quarter, the unemployment rate did officially tick up by 0.1% to 8.3% in the quarter.
In today’s report, nonfarm business output rose by 2.0% in the second quarter, lower than the 2.7% gain in the first quarter. The hours worked rose by 0.4% in the second quarter, versus 3.2% higher in the first quarter. These modest gains are also largely reflected in that low GDP growth of 1.5% we saw on a preliminary GDP basis as well.
JON C. OGG
Contact [email protected] for any questions or corrections.
Jon Ogg has been a financial news analyst since 1997. Mr. Ogg set up one of the first audio squawk box services for traders called TTN, which he sold in 2003. He has previously worked as a licensed broker to some of the top U.S. and E.U. financial institutions, managed capital, and has raised private capital at the seed and venture stage. He has lived in Copenhagen, Denmark, as well as New York and Chicago, and he now lives in Houston, Texas. Jon received a Bachelor of Business Administration in finance at University of Houston in 1992. www.247wallst.com.
