> BLS DAILY REPORT, Friday, May 11, 2001
>
> RELEASED TODAY: The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods rose 0.3
> percent in April, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of
> the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. This increase followed a
> 0.1-percent decline in March and a 0.1-percent gain in February. The
> index for finished goods other than foods and energy moved up 0.2 percent,
> compared with a 0.1-percent increase in March. Prices received by
> producers of intermediate goods fell 0.2 percent in April, the same rate
> of decrease as in the prior month. The crude goods index turned up O.9
> percent, following a 1.7-percent drop in March.
>
> Import prices declined across a broad array of products in April, falling
> 0.5 percent as demand for industrial supplies softened during the month,
> the Bureau of Labor statistics reported May 10. April marked the seventh
> consecutive month in which import prices have either fallen or remained
> flat. Prices for imported industrial supplies and materials fell 0.6
> percent in April--the sixth consecutive month in which prices for
> industrial supplies and materials have fallen, BLS said (Daily Labor
> Report, page D-1).
>
> New claims filed with state agencies for unemployment insurance benefits
> stood at 384,000 for the week ended May 5, down 41,000 from last week's
> five-year high of 425,000, according to a report released May 10 by the
> Labor Department's Employment and Training Administration....Paralleling
> the recent surge in initial UI claims, on May 4, the Bureau of Labor
> Statistics reported that the civilian unemployment rate climbed 0.2
> percentage point to 4.5 percent in April (Daily Labor Report, page D-3).
>
> The economic slowdown will stop short of a recession but will persist
> through the remainder of this year, predicted top executives of some of
> the nation's largest corporations May 9 during the spring meeting of the
> Business Council held in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va....Members
> overwhelmingly said they believe the Federal Reserve's recent reduction of
> short-term interest rates "has helped to boost the economy, or at least to
> stave off recesion," the Business Council's vice chairman said. Tax cuts
> and further interest rate cuts would help to ensure continued expansion,
> the business leaders said ( Daily Labor Report, page A-10).
>
> Price-conscious shoppers helped bolster retail sales last month. That's
> the message from chain stores, which yesterday released better than
> expected sales numbers for April. But the increases were not distributed
> evenly across the board. Discount chains such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and
> Costco Wholesale Corp. posted sales increases of 6 percent or better,
> while other department stores such as Nordstrom Inc., reported declines of
> 6 percent or more......(Washington Post, page E1)
>
> Productivity is not what it was cracked up to be, according to Floyd
> Norris, writing in the New York Times (page C1). And therein lies one of
> the great fallacies of the recent boom and bubble. Productivity, at least
> as measured by the government, zoomed in recent years, rising at a faster
> rate than at any time since the 1960's. That increase helped to persuade
> many economists that it was a new era, one in which old economic verities
> might not apply. The reality of the productivity explosion was that it
> was concentrated in the information technology industry. Some of that
> rise was not real anyway, since the government's statistical adjustments
> probably exaggerated the improvements in computers. But the failure of
> the productivity measures to show big gains in other areas should have
> been telling. "If it was a real productivity miracle, how come we didn't
> see it other places?" asked Greg Jensen, an analyst at Bridgewater
> Associates(NewYork Times, page C1).
>
> The number of U.S. workers filing first time applications for unemployment
> benefits fell sharply last week from a five-year record, but the overall
> level remained high as the economic slowdown continued to pressure the
> labor market. The Labor Department said North Carolina saw the biggest
> increase during the April 28 week, with a rise of 9,020 initial claims.
> It attributed the increase to layoffs in the textile, furniture,
> transportation and computer-equipment industries(Wall Street Journal, page
> A2).
>
> The Labor Department reported Thursday that initial applications for the
> jobless benefits dropped 41,000, to a seasonally adjusted 384,000, for the
> week ended May 5. Claims were down from the week before, when 425,000
> claims for unemployment insurance were posted - the highest level since
> March 23, 1996, when they stood at 428, 000 (USA Today, page 2B).
>
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