Fifth District Survey of Non-Manufacturing Activity: Availability of skills needed: Current (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally adjusted) - United States - Richmond FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Fifth District Survey of Non-Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. According to survey data about nonmanufacturing firms based in the Fifth District, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for the availability of skills needed (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -3.0 in September 2026, compared to -4.0 in August 2026.
Sample. There are 190 records in the monthly series shown in the plot above. The time period covered by the series is from December 2010 to September 2026.
History. Here's a glimpse of a few summary statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index recorded a bottom of -32.0 in June 2021; it reached its maximum of 20.0 in May 2020; it was equal on average to -4.3.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-07-31 | -1.00000 |
| 2026-08-31 | -4.00000 |
| 2026-09-30 | -3.00000 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did the availability of skills needed increase or decrease in the past month? |
| Country | United States |
| Economic concept | Business survey response |
| Data type | Coincident indicator of the business cycle |
| Deflation method | Not applicable |
| Seasonally adjusted | Yes |
| 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) |
| Other information | Not available |
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