Productivity: a history of its measurement

Abstract

Productivity has long been an important concept in economics. Despite this long history, the full quantification of productivity dates back largely to work undertaken by economists in the middle part of the twentieth century. The purpose of the paper, therefore, is to describe the origins of the concept in general and in particular the efforts to develop the means to quantify it. To a significant degree, the economic issues that have arisen, as well as general developments in economic theory have influenced the development of productivity quantification efforts.