2003 Revised International Comparisons of Manufacturing Productivity and Unit Labor Cost Trends — 2005-02-25

Revised data for 2003 show that the increase in U.S. manufacturing productivity (+9.7 percent) was the second highest among 14 economies compared, according to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. This was below the increase recorded in Japan (+11 percent) and ahead of Korea (+9 percent). The United Kingdom and Sweden also showed productivity gains of over 5 percent, while productivity remained constant in Canada and declined in Italy. (See chart 1.) The U.S. productivity growth in 2003, an upward revision from the preliminary estimate of 6.8 percent released in September 2004, continues the rapid growth of U.S. manufacturing productivity after 2000, at 6.9 percent per year on average. This was the fastest growth rate in those years among the 14 economies for which comparable data are available. Only in two other economies did productivity growth surpass 5 percent per year after 2000.