On Tuesday, purchasing managers are likely to report that the services sector grew strongly in July. The following day, official figures are likely to show that manufacturing output and industrial production rose in June, reversing some of May's sharp fall; if the figures are consistent with GDP numbers, they'll show that manufacturing output grew by 0.4 per cent in the second quarter. Later on Tuesday, the NIESR is likely to say that GDP grew by around 0.7 per cent in the three months to July - a figure that will be depressed by a drop in output in May.
Despite all this, the Bank is expected to leave rates unchanged on Thursday - although there might well be more of a debate about a rise than there has been recently.
One reason for their reluctance to act is that the outlook for our biggest trading partner, the eurozone, is unclear. The good news is that purchasing managers' surveys on Tuesday should confirm that growth in the services sector picked up in July, to a 38-month high. However, official figures from France and Germany are expected to show that industrial production in June did not bounce back so strongly as to fully offset May's big falls. As a result, output in both countries is likely to have fallen in the second quarter.
The ECB is unlikely to respond to this on Thursday. However, with inflation far below target and the euro still stronger than it would like, ECB president Mario Draghi might hint at further policy easing in his press conference.
One other thing to note will be Friday's US productivity figures. They should show that output per worker-hour in the business sector rose in the second quarter, reversing the first-quarter's drop. However, trend productivity growth does seem to have slowed. The figures are likely to show that productivity grew by 1.5 per cent per year in the last five years compared with 2.3 per cent in the 20 years to 2007. This would be consistent with a slowdown in the US's potential growth rate - because of a mix of secular stagnation and the effects of the financial crisis. The financial media's focus upon short-term data distracts us from this worrying longer-term trend.
