typekey:junkcharts meinte am 24. Aug, 06:21:
the chart and the text
Here is another case of a chart not fully supporting the text. The text said (my italics)Thanks in part to this new flexibility, unit labour costs, a benchmark of competitiveness, have fallen sharply relative to other countries. In the past five years, Germany, long the most costly place in Europe in which to do business, has won a new competitive edge over France, Italy, the Netherlands and even Britain.
Now, the chart actually shows both Spain and Italy (and possibly even France) having higher unit labor costs than Germany five years ago (which was year 2000 by my count). For much of the period depicted, Germany was the least costly place so this chart does not depict a turnaround.
Secondly, the advantage over Britain is certainly the most shocking assertion and yet mysteriously Britain is left out of the plot. Since this data is available, there must have been a conscious decision to omit it. Why?
Mahalanobis antwortete am 24. Aug, 18:34:
RE: unit labour costs
Now, the chart actually shows both Spain and Italy (and possibly even France) having higher unit labor costs than Germany five years ago (which was year 2000 by my count).The plot shows the the average unit labour cost relative to the euro-area average with the base year set to 100 for all countries. So it perfectly could be the case that unit labour costs in Germany are still the highest in the euro-area... The Economist really should have plotted the data in levels. It's interesting that the source for the time series is the EC and the OECD. Mix it, baby? (It's easy to see that those series are smoothed anyway).
I did a quick-and-dirty chart showing the average unit labour cost relative to the euro-area (obtained from eurostat, unfortunately, they only have the series "Unit labour cost growth") for Germany and the UK with base year 1994. It's really questionable if Germany currently has such a competitive edge.
