By the numbers

-- Industrial Distribution, 10/2/2008 11:25:00 AM

Data from the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that only three nations had greater manufacturing productivity growth than the United States between 2000 and 2007. But the news so far this year is far less rosy.

The Republic of Korea and Taiwan led a roster of 16 nations in manufacturing labor productivity increases last year, according to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. The 4.1 percent rise in the United States placed it fourth on the list.

South Korea and Taiwan each posted increases of 8.7 percent, with Germany following at 5 percent.

Only Italy (-0.5 percent) and Norway (-0.2 percent) posted declines.

And between 2000 and 2007, the United States posted the fourth-best productivity increase, with only Korea, Taiwan and Sweden ahead.

That’s partly due to declining labor costs; unit labor costs for American manufacturers slid 0.5 percent last year, the fifth-=steepest such slide among the 16 economies the agency studied.

The decline of the dollar’s value against foreign currencies took Australia’s productivity from 2.8 percent to 14.5 percent in unit labor costs, as the value of that nation’s dollar surged against the greenback. Norway, Italy, Sweden, Spain and Denmark also benefited from the buck’s slide.

But during the second quarter, manufacturing productivity slid 2.2 percent in the U.S., the largest quarterly decline in since 1989.

The slide was largely fueled by a 4.5 percent decline in productivity for the durable goods manufacturing sector. Manufacturing accounts for roughly 12 percent of employment in the United States business sector, according to the Labor Dept.

The news was better for the overall economy, which saw productivity rise 4.3 percent for both the business and non-farm business sectors.

That came as a surprise to analysts, the Bloomberg news service reported, who had based their forecasts on the Labor Dept.’s less rosy prediction in August.

The government predicted a quarterly productivity increase of only 2.2 percent last month, according to the news service, which would have been a slight drop from the 2.6 percent increase reported for the first quarter.

Overall labor costs fell during the quarter by 1 percent.

“Businesses are finding ways to improve productivity, and achieving it at very low labor costs,” Julia Coronado, senior economist at Barclays Capital Inc. in New York, told the news service. “There's no imminent threat of inflation pressures coming from wages.”