The efficiency of American workers rose in 2005 at the slowest pace since the recession year of 2001 while a key gauge of wage pressures rose at the fastest pace in five years, the government reported Thursday.
The Labor Department said productivity rose by 2.7 percent last year while labor costs rose by 2.4 percent, the biggest jump since a 4.2 percent increase in 2000. For just the final three months of the year, productivity actually fell by 0.6 percent, the first decline since early 2001, and labor costs rose by 2.4 percent.
In other economic news, the government said the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits dropped to 273,000 last week, a decline of 11,000 from the previous week.
