Business Communications: Inflation tables, Unemployment Tables, Interest Rate Tables

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Inflation Table

The Inflation table below is updated monthly and provides the current US Inflation Rate plus Monthly Inflation Rate data back to January 2000. The Inflation rate is calculated using the Current Consumer Price Index (CPI-U) published monthly by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Current Inflation Rate
Year Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Ave
2006 3.99% 3.60% 3.36% 3.55% 4.17% 4.32% 4.15% 3.82% 2.06% 1.31% 1.97% 2.54% 3.24%
2005 2.97% 3.01% 3.15% 3.51% 2.80% 2.53% 3.17% 3.64% 4.69% 4.35% 3.46% 3.42% 3.39%
2004 1.93% 1.69% 1.74% 2.29% 3.05% 3.27% 2.99% 2.65% 2.54% 3.19% 3.52% 3.26% 2.68%
2003 2.60% 2.98% 3.02% 2.22% 2.06% 2.11% 2.11% 2.16% 2.32% 2.04% 1.77% 1.88% 2.27%
2002 1.14% 1.14% 1.48% 1.64% 1.18% 1.07% 1.46% 1.80% 1.51% 2.03% 2.20% 2.38% 1.59%
2001 3.73% 3.53% 2.92% 3.27% 3.62% 3.25% 2.72% 2.72% 2.65% 2.13% 1.90% 1.55% 2.83%
2000 2.74% 3.22% 3.76% 3.07% 3.19% 3.73% 3.66% 3.41% 3.45% 3.45% 3.45% 3.39% 3.38%

Unemployment Tables

Table 1. Registered unemployment and unemployment by Labour Force Survey
Year Rate of registered unemployment at the end of year (%) Rate of job seekers to the economically active population, in November of year (%)
Total Males Females
1995 6.4 18.9 18.0 19.7
1996 7.2 18.3 17.7 18.9
1997 7.0 14.4 14.6 14.3
1998 9.2 13.8 13.5 14.1
1999 9.1 14.5 15.5 13.3
Source: CSB data and SES data
Table 2. Unemployment rate by age, November 1999
Job seekers, thsd population Unemployment rate
( november,1999)
Total in the country Urban areas Rural areas Total in the country Urban areas Rural areas
15-19 11.2 8.2 3.1 36.6 42.9 27.0
20-24 23.7 17.7 6 21.3 22.2 19.2
25-34 41.9 31.8 10 14.2 15.0 11.9
35-44 45.2 37.4 7.8 13.9 16.1 8.5
45-54 33.1 2.7 6 13.5 14.9 9.4
55-59 6.8 4.8 1.9 8.2 8.4 7.5
60 and more 5.5 4.7 0.8 8.2 11.3 3.1
Total 167.3 131.7 35.6 14.5 16.0 10.7
Source: Labour force in Latvia. Labour force survey data, November 1999. A statistical bulletin. Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia. Riga, March 2000.
Table 3. Registered unemployment rate by educational attainment (percentage)
1995 1996 1997 1998 1999
Total 100 100 100 100 100
Of which:
Higher 5.9 6.0 6.1 6.8 7.1
Secondary vocational 21.1 21.3 21.7 21.4 21.4
Vocational 12.3 14.6 16.3 16.6 17.7
General secondary 34.1 33.4 30.2 31.3 30.9
Basic, incomplete basic 26.6 24.7 25.7 23.9 22.9
Source: SES data
Table 4. Job seekers by duration of job-seeking and gender (in thousands), 1999
Total in the country Urban areas Rural areas
Total Males Females Total Males Females Total Males Females
Total 167.3 94.4 72.9 131.7 73.3 58.4 35.6 21.1 14.5
By duration of job seeking
Under 1 month 1.8 1.4 0.4 1.4 1.2 0.2 0.4 0.3 0.1
1 - 2 months 19.4 10.6 8.8 17.0 9.4 7.6 2.4 1.2 1.2
3 - 5 months 19.6 13.2 6.4 15.6 10.7 4.9 4.0 2.5 1.5
6 -12 months 30.0 17.7 12.3 23.7 14.0 9.7 6.4 3.7 2.6
1 - 2 years 40.1 23.2 17.0 33.9 19.7 14.3 6.2 3.5 2.7
3 - 4 years 18.5 10.3 8.3 15.0 7.8 7.3 3.5 2.5 1.0
5 years and more 27.6 13.1 14.5 19.8 8.5 11.2 7.8 4.5 3.3
Source: Labour force in Latvia. Labour force survey data, November 1999. A statistical bulletin. Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia. Riga, March 2000.

Inflation Vs Unemployment

The Phillips curve is a historical inverse relation and tradeoff between the rate of unemployment and the rate of inflation in an economy. Stated simply, the lower the unemployment in an economy, the higher the rate of change in wages paid to labor in that economy.
The New Zealand-born economist A.W. Phillips, in his 1958 paper "The relationship between unemployment and the rate of change of money wages in the UK 1861-1957" published in the now quarterly journal Economica, observed an inverse relationship between money wage changes and unemployment in the British economy over the period examined. Similar patterns were found in other countries and in 1960 Paul Samuelson and Robert Solow took Phillips' work and made explicit the link between inflation and unemployment—when inflation was high, unemployment was low, and vice-versa.
It is little known that ...