Productivity surges, job growth should follow
The Labor Department said on Thursday that productivity surged at a 9.5 percent annual rate, the quickest pace since the third quarter of 2003, as companies squeezed more output from a smaller pool of labor to hold the line on costs.
“We expect the pace of efficiency gains will soon begin to fade,” said Michelle Girard, a senior economist at RBS in Greenwich, Connecticut. “Having cut payrolls so dramatically during the last downturn, we believe that companies will be forced to add workers earlier in this recovery than was the case following the last two recessions.”
Click the photo at right to view the entire November 5th, 2009 Reuters article.
