Working hard or hardly working?
Productivity numbers are in from the Labor Department, and they’re ho-hum (1.3% annualized growth in the second quarter). The numbers have been pretty low and choppy for the past 4+ years, with a large number of revisions thrown in there.
Despite the wondrous age of technological innovation we’re experiencing, we aren’t getting the same boost from tech that we used to. Take a step back, and productivity growth is way down from the dot-com boom or the post-recession years that sapped wage growth.
Capital Economics suggested in a note to clients that if productivity remains this so-so, Americans might need to adjust their expectations of 3% GDP growth (paywall), let alone 4%.