Area Development
A 0.1 percent decrease in the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers led to a real average hourly earnings increase for all employees of 0.1 percent from March to April, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports today. Average hourly earnings did not change over the past month.

Real average weekly earnings grew by 0.4 percent in April, due to a 0.3 percent increase in the number of hours employees worked each week. Real average weekly earnings have grown by 1.2 percent combined over the past six months. However, on a yearly basis from last April to 2010, real average hourly earnings dropped 0.6 percent. But as hours worked per week rose by the same percentage, it resulted in no change in the value of earnings.

Production and nonsupervisory employees saw their real average hourly earnings increased by 0.3 percent over the past month. However, those gains were tempered slightly by a 0.1 percent drop in the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers. Real average weekly earnings in this category rose by 0.7 percent over the month, and 1.5 percent since last June 2009.