August 18, 2005 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Producer prices in July 2005

The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods advanced 1.0 percent in July 2005, seasonally adjusted. This increase followed no change in June and a 0.6-percent decline in May.

[Chart data—TXT]

The finished energy goods index increased 4.4 percent in July, compared with a 2.0-percent gain in June. Leading this acceleration, residential natural gas prices advanced 3.7 percent, following a 3.2-percent decrease in the previous month. The index for residential electric power also turned up, after declining in June. Prices for gasoline and liquefied petroleum gas rose more than they had in the prior month.

The rate of decrease in the finished consumer foods index slowed from 1.1 percent in June to 0.3 percent in July. Prices for finished goods other than foods and energy moved up 0.4 percent in July, after decreasing 0.1 percent a month earlier.

From July 2004 to July 2005, the finished goods index increased 4.6 percent (as shown in the chart). Over the same period, prices for finished energy goods advanced 15.2 percent, prices for finished consumer foods rose 1.4 percent, and the index for finished goods other than foods and energy increased 2.8 percent.

These data are from the BLS Producer Price Index program. For more information, see "Producer Price Indexes -- July 2005" (PDF) (TXT), news release USDL 05-1561.  All producer price indexes are routinely subject to revision once, 4 months after original publication, to reflect the availability of late reports and corrections by respondents.