Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey: Average employee workweek: Current (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally adjusted) - United States - Philly FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey (Philly FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. Based on a sample of manufacturing firms surveyd by the FED, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for the average employee workweek (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was 9.1 in January 2026, compared to 12.5 in December 2025.
Sample. There are 693 observations overall in the monthly time series shown in the chart above. The series covers the time span stretching from May 1968 to January 2026.
History. Here are some simple statistics we computed on the whole sample: the diffusion index attained a maximum of 36.5 in March 2021; it recorded a bottom of -53.5 in April 2020; it was equal on average to 0.2.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-30 | 7.2 |
| 2025-12-31 | 12.5 |
| 2026-01-31 | 9.1 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did the average employee workweek 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 Philadelphia |
| 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) |
Series in the same data set
Discover the other time series included in this data set.