Good or Bad Figures

I see lots of national and regional productivity figures ... I even publish some of them in this blog.

However, I am holding back at the moment ... the recent (ongoing?) recession means that most figures are not really to be trusted. Oh, they're 'accurate' ... but at the start and end of recessions especially there are lag effects that make interpretation of the figures more difficult ... and certainly more dangerous.

So, in many countries productivity appears to be going up .. but that's because output is rising but many organisations have not started re-hiring ... they are using overtime and other temporary ways of providing the resources necessary to create those outputs.

So, governments should be way about trumpeting higher productivity ... in time the figures will settle to their 'real' levels.