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The Producer Price Index (PPI) is a measure of the average change over time in the prices domestic producers receive for the sale of their products. PPI estimates for May 2021 were published on June 15, 2021. The pricing date was Tuesday, May 11, 2021, which means that most producers, but not all, provided prices they received on that date. The summary statistics in tables 1, 2, 3 and 4 indicate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the PPI data collection, index estimation, and the BLS ability to publish indexes was minor for the release of preliminary May data. No changes in estimation procedures were necessary.
This page provides information on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic for the May 2021 Producer Price Indexes news release.
The PPI collects nearly all of its repricing data by web collection. There were no changes to collection mode in response to the pandemic.
Table 1 provides the May 2021 response rate by industry sector, along with comparison periods of May 2020, April 2021, and a 12-month average for March 2019 to February 2020.
It is important to note that typically the PPI survey’s monthly price collection response rate averages 76 percent by the end of its 4-month index revision period. All PPIs are recalculated 4 months after publication of preliminary data. Thus, May 2021 indexes may be revised when BLS publishes the PPI for September on October 14, 2021. All summary statistics in the tables below reflect comparisons to PPI preliminary data.
Industry sectors | 12-month average, March 2019 to February 2020 | May 2020 | April 2021 | May 2021 | Percentage point change from April 2021 to May 2021 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
All industrial sectors |
69 | 73 | 74 | 74 | 0 |
Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting |
47 | 44 | 47 | 47 | 0 |
Mining, utilities, and construction |
66 | 71 | 75 | 72 | -3 |
Manufacturing |
74 | 74 | 76 | 76 | 0 |
Wholesale trade |
62 | 61 | 65 | 65 | 0 |
Retail trade |
75 | 76 | 77 | 79 | +2 |
Transportation and warehousing |
80 | 83 | 84 | 82 | -2 |
Finance, real estate, and other information services |
79 | 78 | 78 | 81 | +3 |
Health care services |
59 | 61 | 65 | 61 | -4 |
Entertainment, accommodation and food services |
66 | 39 | 48 | 45 | -3 |
Other services, except public administration |
80 | 95 | 100 | 100 | 0 |
When a respondent does not provide a price for an item, BLS employs an imputation method of replacing that missing price with a statistically estimated value. Missing prices are imputed by the prices of similar items that have been collected. Essentially, the price movement of items that are not collected are estimated to be the same as those in their general index category. Table 2 indicates that the May 2021 item imputation rate of 38 percent reflects an increase from the preceding month but is still below the other comparison periods.
Measure | 12-month average, March 2019 to February 2020 | May 2020 | April 2021 | May 2021 | Percentage point change from April 2021 to May 2021 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Item imputation rate |
39 | 40 | 35 | 38 | +3 |
BLS calculates over 10,000 PPIs for individual products and groups of products for publication during the release of preliminary data. The first row of table 3 shows the May 2021 publication rate is very similar to the comparison periods. BLS suppresses indexes when they fail to meet publication criteria. Because of additional collection efforts along with late-arriving data, these suppressed indexes often will meet publication criteria at the end of the 4-month index revision period, at which time they are published. (Upon request, BLS will provide a list of indexes that did not meet publication criteria for the release of preliminary PPI data. Please email requests to ppi-info@bls.gov.)
Further illustrating the nominal impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the second row of table 3 shows the percent of industry indexes that BLS was unable to calculate because BLS did not receive any prices for that index. This proportion of not calculated indexes for May 2021 is similar to the normal result.
Table 4 takes a closer look at the not calculated PPI indexes by industry and reflects that across all industry sectors there is little difference between May’s result when compared with earlier periods.
Measure | 12-month average, March 2019 to February 2020 | May 2020 | April 2021 | May 2021 | Percentage point change from April 2021 to May 2021 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Percent of indexes (intended to publish) that were actually published |
89 | 89 | 88 | 88 | 0 |
Percent of PPI industry indexes not calculated |
6 | 7 | 7 | 8 | +1 |
Industry sectors | 12-month average, March 2019 to February 2020 | May 2020 | April 2021 | May 2021 | Percentage point change from April 2021 to May 2021 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
All industrial sectors |
6 | 7 | 7 | 8 | +1 |
Agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting |
3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 0 |
Mining, utilities, and construction |
13 | 15 | 16 | 16 | 0 |
Manufacturing |
7 | 7 | 8 | 8 | 0 |
Wholesale trade |
4 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 0 |
Retail trade |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Transportation and warehousing |
0 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Finance, real estate, and other information services |
1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
Health care services |
10 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 0 |
Entertainment, accommodation and food services |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Other services, except public administration |
0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Note: BLS collects price data to support several thousand industry PPIs, from lower-level industry product lines up to 2-digit industry sectors. All of the noncalculating indexes are below the industry (6-digit) level and reflect industry product lines. BLS calculates some detailed, lower-level PPI indexes that are not intended to meet publication criteria but are necessary for weighting and imputation purposes. |
Last Modified Date: June 15, 2021