April 22, 2002 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Korea had largest productivity gains in manufacturing in 2000

Revised data from BLS show that Korea’s gain in manufacturing labor productivity of 10.7 percent was the highest in 2000 of 13 industrialized countries.

[Chart data—TXT]

Productivity growth in manufacturing in both Germany and France was 6.2 percent in 2000. Japan registered an increase of 5.7 percent in output per hour. In the United States, manufacturing output per hour grew by 5.5 percent in 2000, the fifth largest increase among the 13 countries.

These data are a product of the BLS Foreign Labor Statistics program. Data are subject to revision. This article updates an item that appeared in The Editor’s Desk last year: "U.S. led in factory productivity gains in 2000". Additional information is available in "International Comparisons of Labor Productivity and Unit Labor Costs in Manufacturing, 2000," BLS Report 962.