Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Wages: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally unadjusted) - United States - Richmond FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. Based on a sample of manufacturing firms surveyd by the FED, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for wages (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share reporting a decrease) was 45.0 in July 2026, compared to 41.0 in the previous month.
Sample. In this monthly time series, there are 353 data points in total. The series covers the time span extending from January 1997 to July 2026.
History. Take a look at a few statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index reached a trough of -2.0 in April 2020; it recorded a maximum of 81.0 in December 2021; it averaged 37.4.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-05-31 | 47.0 |
| 2026-06-30 | 41.0 |
| 2026-07-31 | 45.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will wages increase or decrease over the next six months? |
| Country | United States |
| Economic concept | Business survey response |
| Data type | Leading indicator of the business cycle |
| Deflation method | Not applicable |
| Seasonally adjusted | No |
| Rescaling | None |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Unit | Percentage points |
| Source | Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond |
| Source type | Central bank |
| Data licence | Not copyrightable under U.S. law |
| Measure type | Diffusion index (share of respondents reporting an increase minus share reporting a decrease) |
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