Third quarter 2009 productivity revised to 8.1 percent

Nonfarm business sector labor productivity increased at an 8.1 percent annual rate during the third quarter of 2009. This was the largest gain in productivity since the third quarter of 2003, and reflects a 2.9 percent increase in output and a 4.8 percent decline in hours worked.

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These productivity measures were based on more recent and more complete data than were available for the preliminary report issued last month.

In the third quarter of 2009, nonfarm business productivity was revised down from 9.5 percent to 8.1 percent, reflecting a downward revision to output and an upward revision to hours.

These data, from the Productivity and Costs program, are seasonally adjusted and are subject to revision. To learn more about productivity, output, hours and related measures, see "Productivity and Costs: Third Quarter 2009, Revised" (HTML) (PDF), news release USDL-09-1478. Labor productivity is calculated by dividing an index of real output by an index of the combined hours worked of all persons, including employees, proprietors, and unpaid family workers.