Productivity and Trump's Tax Turnoff?

Donald Trump is hailing his tax cutting plans as 'radical' and likely to stimulate US growth.How will they affect US productivity?

Well, the way in which productivity responds to trade measures is not clear ... but if corporations are paying less tax, they may spend more on capital infrastructure or on R&D - and both of those are generally beneficial to productivity.  However, they take time to show up in the figures - so don't expect short term productivity gains.  And with long-term investments, often something else (some short term effect or expediency) often intervenes.

So, as ever, we wait and see.  We hope.  And if it all works our, we might have to hail Trump as a visionary.

Should we encourage laziness?

Is laziness helpful in making people more productive? does it encourage them to seek less arduous ways of achieving the same output?

Well, certainly the opposite is not true  Busyness is not a sign of high productivity. Too many people are busy but essentially unproductive - because they are either doing the wrong things or doing them in the wrong way.

Think about people like maintenance engineers - ideally we want them either doing nothing or carrying out planned maintenance - we do not want them working on breakdowns and emergencies.

So, perhaps we should encourage people to create more 'idle time' as a reward for improving how they carry out their own tasks

IMF is right

The head of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde, has issued a stark warning that living standards will fall around the world unless governments take urgent action to increase productivity by investing in education, cutting red tape and incentivising research and development.

 Whether or not, you agree that her prescription is what is needed to improve productivity - or is complete, it is good that someone so influential is spreading the message about the need for productivity development. 

I actually think she has got it mostly right - I would add infrastructure development, and would add training to education ... but her summary is pretty effective.

Well, I declare ...

I am just returning from the Wold Productivity Congress - an interesting and rewarding event.The  programme was too rich and varied to be summarised here but the spirit of the even† is captured by
the Congress Declaration which is reproduced here.

Declaration - Bahrain 2017

We, the members of the global productivity movement, gathered in Bahrain for the World Productivity Congress from 1st to 4th April 2017 have been informed and inspired by three days of discussion, debate and deliberation on the Congress Theme of "New Roads to Innovation and Higher Productivity”. 

This theme was in part inspired by the position of Bahrain (like other nations in the Gulf region) as needing to move to become a post-oil economy and needing to identify a range of routes towards economic growth. 

As a result of our deliberations, we, the members of the global productivity community affirm the following principles underlining productivity development:

·      improved productivity remains the only effective route to creating secure and sustainable solutions to the provision of energy, food and water to the growing global population;

·      productivity development must be supported by innovative thinking and technological development, which in turn need the establishment of a supportive innovation ecosystem; 

·      at the national level, productivity development is supported by the creation of healthy communities (of engaged, empowered and participating citizens;

·      though the overall concepts and philosophy of productivity science remain globally applicable, specific productivity campaigns, approaches, tools and techniques must be applied in ways which are informed by local history and culture;

·      at the organisational level, productivity improvement is supported by an informed, engaged workforce, members of which have their knowledge and skills regularly reviewed and refreshed.

We pledge our individual and collective commitment to:

spreading awareness of these principles to key policy and decision-makers.

ensuring that national and regional productivity development policy and practice is informed by the above principles

We thank the country of Bahrain for creating a rich and rewarding event which led to the formation of these principles and we thank His Highness Shaikh Mohamed bi Mubarak Al Khalifa, Deputy Prime Minister of Bahrain, for his guidance and leadership as patron of the Congress.