August 30, 2006 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Multifactor productivity, 1996-2005

In the private business sector, multifactor productivity—output per combined units of labor and capital inputs—grew at an annual rate of 1.8 percent in 2005.

[Chart data—TXT]

The estimate of multifactor productivity in the private business sector for 2005 shows a slower rate of growth than the past two years.

A change in multifactor productivity reflects the change in output that cannot be accounted for by the change in combined inputs of labor and capital.

The multifactor productivity gain in 2005 reflected a 4.0-percent increase in output and a 2.2-percent increase in the combined inputs of capital and labor.

These data are from the Multifactor Productivity program. Productivity data are subject to revision. To learn more, see "Preliminary Multifactor Productivity Trends, 2005," (PDF) (TXT) news release USDL 06-1510.