More than one hundred and fifty one million Americans are employed, a number that has expanded sharply over the past several years. Collectively, Americans are also working more hours. As indicated by writer Neil Irwin, the number of hours of effort supplied by Americans grew one point nine percent during the twelve month period ending this March.
New data released indicate that gross domestic product during the first quarter of this year was one point nine percent greater than output generated during last year’s first quarter. This means that despite continuous advances in software, equipment and management practices, productivity is not expanding in America.
In other words, we are generating the same amount of output per hour worked as we did this time last year. This may simply be a statistical aberration. Productivity data are notoriously volatile. But as pointed out by Irwin, between two thousand and eleven and twenty fifteen, the government’s official labor productivity measure indicates only zero point four percent annual growth in output per hour of work.
That the lowest for a five year span since the nineteen seventy seven to nineteen eight two period. When productivity growth is slow, wage growth also tends to be soft.