Multifactor Productivity

Multifactor Productivity

May 06, 2008
Multifactor productivity grew at an annual rate of 0.7 percent in the private business sector, and 0.6 percent in the private nonfarm business sector in 2007. In both sectors, multifactor productivity showed a slight increase from the previous year. More...
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Current Economic News Releases

• NEW Preliminary Multifactor Productivity Trends, 2007--Preliminary Published Data for Major Sectors. (HTML) (PDF)
• NEW Multifactor Productivity Trends in Manufacturing--Published Data for 18 NAICS 3-digit Manufacturing Industries. (HTML) (PDF)
• Multifactor Productivity Trends for Detailed Manufacturing Industries--Published Data for 86 NAICS 4-digit Manufacturing Industries. (HTML) (PDF)

Archived

• Multifactor Productivity Trends, 2006 --Detailed Published Data for Major Sectors. See current news release above (HTML) (PDF)--Preliminary Published Data for Major Sectors. See current news release above.
• Archived Multifactor Productivity Trends –- Published Data for Major Sectors back to 1981

Databases

Data on major sectors and 18 NAICS 3-digit manufacturing industries

MFP Databases

Database Name	Special Notice	Top Picks	One Screen	Multi- Screen	Text Files
Tutorials: For help, try these tutorials
Major Sector Multifactor Productivity Index

More Tools

• Series Report--Already know the series identifier for the statistic you want? Use this shortcut to retrieve your data.
• Text files (FTP)--For those who want it all. Download a text file of the entire database or large subset of the database.

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IMPORTANT Download standard multifactor data tables:

• Comprehensive tables of multifactor productivity and related capital data for private business, private nonfarm business and manufacturing.
• Historical multifactor productivity measures (SIC 1948-87 linked to NAICS 1987-2006)
• Superseded historical SIC measures for private business and private nonfarm business sectors, 1948-2002
• Multifactor productivity data table for utility services.

NEW Multifactor productivity data for 4-digit NAICS manufacturing industries

• Indexes
• Rates of change
• Cost shares

Multifactor productivity data for air transportation (NAICS 481)

Superceded historical multifactor productivity data for SIC manufacturing industries and railroad transportation

• Indexes, 1987-99
• Indexes, historical to 1987

Analytic Tables and Charts

• NEW Multifactor Productivity Growth by Major Sector, 1948-2006. Bar Chart
• Contributions of Manufacturing Industries to private nonfarm business multifactor productivity (PDF 50K)
• Sources of growth in Real Output in the private nonfarm business sector (PDF 29K)
• Contribution of Research and Development to Private Nonfarm Business Multifactor Productivity
• Sources of growth in Real Output in the private business sector (PDF 29K)

• NEW Technical Information About the BLS Multifactor Productivity Measures for Major Sectors and 18 NAICS 3-digit Manufacturing Industries (HTML) (PDF 130 KB)
• Overview of Capital Inputs for the BLS Multifactor Productivity Measures (HTML) (PDF 213 KB)
• Changes in the Composition of Labor (PDF 48K)
• "Preliminary Estimate of Multifactor Productivity Growth" (PDF 114 KB), by Peter B. Meyer and Michael J. Harper, Monthly Labor Review, June 2005, pp. 32-43.
An error in the multifactor productivity growth rate for 2003 appeared in the original article but it has been corrected in both the electronic and paper versions as of July 8th. Those who downloaded the earlier version should download the corrected version.
• "Multifactor productivity change in the air transportation industry” (PDF 73 KB), by John Duke and Victor Torres, Monthly Labor Review, March 2005, pp.32-45.
• "Multifactor productivity trends in manufacturing industries, 1987-96," PDF (91k), by Ziaul Z. Ahmed and Patricia S. Wilder, Monthly Labor Review, June 2001, pp.3-11.
• Multifactor Productivity Measures for Three-digit SIC Manufacturing Industries, 1990-99," (PDF 150K) Report 956, January 2002.
• Archive of MLR Articles on Productivity and Technology.
• BLS Handbook of Methods, Bulletin 2490, April 1997.
• "Productivity Measures: Business Sector and Major Subsectors," Chapter 10 of the BLS Handbook of Methods, BLS Bulletin 2490, April 1997, pp. 89-102.
• "Industry Productivity Measures," Chapter 11 of the BLS Handbook of Methods, BLS Bulletin 2490, April 1997, pp. 103-109.
• "Foreign Labor Statistics," Chapter 12 of the BLS Handbook of Methods, BLS Bulletin 2490, April 1997, pp. 110-121.

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Frequently asked Questions

1. What is the difference between labor productivity and multifactor productivity?
2. Why isn't multifactor productivity available quarterly?
3. What is the most commonly used multifactor productivity measure?
4. Why does the output per hour series in the major sector multifactor productivity dataset differ from the output per hour series in the quarterly labor productivity dataset?
5. How is MFP defined?
6. Why is productivity measurement important?
7. Why isn't MFP available quarterly?
8. How do the multifactor productivity measures for private business and private nonfarm business differ from the measures for the manufacturing sector and manufacturing industries?
9. Are sector or industry productivity measures available for separate regions, states, and cities in the United States?

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MFP Special Notices

NONE

MFP Contacts

Other BLS Programs

• Productivity and Costs--labor productivity and costs for major sectors of the economy (business, nonfarm business, and manufacturing) and for 3- and 4-digit industries.
• Foreign Labor Statistics--comparative information by country on productivity and unit labor costs; compensation; labor force, employment, and unemployment; and consumer prices.
• International Technical Cooperation --conducts training in labor statistics for international participants and coordinates international requests for BLS services including technical experts and short-term visits to BLS.
• Government Productivity Archive
• Employment, Hours, and Earnings from the Current Employment Statistics survey (National)--monthly national data by detailed industry on employment, hours, and earnings of workers on the payrolls of nonfarm establishments.
• Producer Price Indexes--monthly data on changes in the selling prices received by domestic producers of goods and services.

Other Useful Links

• Bureau of the Census
• Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA)