Productivity is one of the BOE’s closely watched indicators and Q2 2014 was unchanged vs Q1 and down 0.3% against last year.
Output per worker increased 0.4% from -0.3% in Q1 while unit labour costs rose 0.1% from -0.4% in Q1. Wage costs also rose 0.4% from 0.2% prior.
The numbers are for the whole economy but the sub categories of Production, Manufacturing and Services paints a weaker picture.
UK Q2 2014 productivity 01 10 2014
There’s not much here to show that slack is falling and although wage costs have picked up we’re still not seeing a big acceleration. The BOE has gone out on a limb with their H2 slowdown call and if it runs into the new year then things might start getting overly dovish within these shores.
