U.S. Economy Contracted at Record Rate Last Quarter; Jobless Claims Rise to 1.43 Million

[progree]

33. Here we go again with idiots from Reuters leaving out the "rate", this time Q2 productivity

among many others, in this first class shitty article.

In brief, this follows a common pattern: the title is incorrect because they leave out rate/pace/annualized whatever. But they included "rate" in the very first line of the article, so not terribly bad so far.

But further on in the article, it reports "an astonishing 32.9% plunge in second-quarter gross domestic product", leaving off rate. As we all know by now, Q2 GDP actually plunged 9.5%, which works out to a 32.9% annualized rate.

It also says "output decreased 38.9%, also the biggest decline ever recorded as hours worked fell 43%" and "Labor costs also jumped, rising 12.2%", and leaves off "rate" in all of these.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-productivity-rises-7-3-124317647.html

US productivity rises 7.3% as hours worked are nearly halved, Reuters, August 14, 2020

U.S. productivity rose at a 7.3% rate in the second quarter as the number of hours worked fell by nearly half, the biggest drop-off since the government started tracking the data more than 70 years ago.

The Labor Department said Friday that output decreased 38.9%, also the biggest decline ever recorded as hours worked fell 43%, with the coronavirus pandemic sowing economic damage throughout the U.S.

The increase in productivity was the largest since 2009. Labor costs also jumped, rising 12.2%.

Friday's report is the first estimate of second-quarter productivity and follows the first quarter’s 0.3% decline. The rise in labor costs, the largest since 2014, follows a 9.8% increase in the January-March quarter. ((these are all almost certainly annualized rates in this paragraph, but I'm too lazy to check --Progree))

... Last month, the government reported an astonishing 32.9% plunge in second-quarter gross domestic product, the value of goods the country produced in the April-June quarter.

As always, check the original source --

(that's why I built the megathread in my sigline ( http://www.democraticunderground.com/111622439 ), though embarrasingly, I don't have this one, the productivity report, except secondarily, I will correct that.)

BLS: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/prod2.nr0.htm 8/14/20

Nonfarm business sector labor productivity increased 7.3 percent in the second quarter of 2020, the
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today, as output decreased 38.9 percent and hours worked
decreased 43.0 percent. (All quarterly percent changes in this release are seasonally adjusted annual
rates, and show what the percent change would be if the quarterly rate continued for four quarters.) In
the four quarters from the second quarter of 2019 to the second quarter of 2020, productivity increased
2.2 percent, reflecting an 11.8-percent decrease in output and a 13.7-percent decrease in hours worked.
(See table A1.)

Unit labor costs in the nonfarm business sector increased at an annual rate of 12.2 percent in the second
quarter of 2020, following an increase of (blah blah blah)

...

Table A1. Labor productivity growth and related measures - preliminary second-quarter 2020
(percent change from previous quarter at annual rate and from same quarter a year ago)
((can't copy and paste table because DU software compresses all sequences of spaces into one. too lazy to Imgur it -Progree))

Edited to add - I finally Imgur'd Table A1 -- see post below (#34)