Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Number of employees: Future (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 Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. According to survey data about manufacturers based in the Fifth District, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for the number of employees (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) was 1.0 in September 2025, compared to 3.0 in August.
Sample. In the monthly time series shown in the figure, there are 290 observations. The series covers the period stretching from January 1993 to September 2025.
History. Have a look at a few descriptive statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index was equal on average to 10.7; it attained a maximum of 53.0 in July 2021; it reached a trough of -17.0 in February 2008.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-07-31 | -10.0 |
| 2025-08-31 | 3.0 |
| 2025-09-30 | 1.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will the number of employees 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 | 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) |
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