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(Bloomberg) -- Productivity in the U.S. unexpectedly posted the first decline in almost four years and labor costs accelerated, suggesting a pickup in efficiency earlier this year was more of a temporary shift.Nonfarm business employee output per hour decreased at a 0.3% annualized rate in the third quarter, according to Labor Department figures Wednesday. That compared with the median projection for a 0.9% increase in Bloomberg’s survey of economists and followed an upwardly revised 2.5% gain in the second quarter. Unit labor costs rose at a 3.6% rate following 2.4% in the prior period.The decline in productivity resulted from a 2.1% increase in output against a 2.4% rise in hours worked. The Labor Department said self-employed workers “made an unusually large contribution” to the increase in hours worked during the quarter and those particular numbers can be more volatile than for the broader workforce. The number of self-employed Americans had risen...
The Kenworth W990’s cross-country trip delivering the “People’s Tree” from New Mexico to Washington D.C. begins on Nov. 11. ...