[Closed] Productivity (economics)

get rid of working time directives and other red tape 🙂

with a big stick.

Many ways. One would be to improve the health of the population so that there are fewer days lost due to illness.

Kill the STW hamsters.

scotroutes - Member
Many ways. One would be to improve the health of the population so that there are fewer days lost due to illness.

This sounds like a good idea

Stop treating people like shit and pay them a living wage then they might work a wee bit harder
Basically the opposite of what Stoner or the other RW say 😉

Encourage companies to invest. The downside with productivity improvements is you need less people to do the same amount of work.

tbh I read the various stories about 'productivity' with a pinch-of-salt, as having worked in most of the European countries (and many across the world) over a long period, most 'feel' about the same overall for the same types of business.

And I can't imagine that the public sector is any different - I've only worked in the UK's public sector so can't really comment, but get the feeling from foreign colleagues that theirs aren't much different.

[i]get rid of working time directives and other red tape [/i]

Working Time Directive seems to boost productivity, since many European countries follow it more than us and they're above us in the 'table'.

And 'red tape' is what keeps you in a job Stoner 🙂

There was an interesting article on the Torygraph a few weeks back suggesting that the UK's relatively lax employment law (compared to France, Germany etc) leads to lower productivity - less incentive to invest in technology when staff can be hired / fired cheaply. Will see if i can find it.

More unemployed people.

Very simple.

1. Cut bureaucracy.
2. Get rid of local councils or make it tiny as most are non-productive.
3. Make it easier to start new company.
4. Set up special low tax light industry zones in all region.
5. Get rid of some of the stoopid H&S shite.
6. Reduce the business rate in regions/areas.
7. Reduce the council tax by 40%-50% (you can if the councils are tiny).
8. Reduce oversea aid/bribes by 50%.
9. Lower tax for exporting companies.
10. Make it easy to export ... ya you pride yourself in logistic ...
11. Reduce tax of haulage companies.
12. Lower tax for manufacturing start up for a period time.

If they can do these the rest will take care of themselves when people have money in their pockets. 😆

All largely driven by so-called supply side economics, currently (and somewhat bizarely) only really being touted by a Socialist government in France.

SSE refers to any action by the government that is intended to increase the amount that companies are willing to supply at a given rate. Productivity is an important element of such policies but generally involves considerable time lags - too much like hard work for short term vote grabbers! Of course, when effective SSE policies can result in both higher growth and lower inflation.

get rid of working time directives and other red tape

I'm sure the OECD had a report out earlier this year calling that one bull poo. They didn't need to, all they needed to do was point to the UK, to see how well we are doing.

Very simple.

It is. For an idiot.

I don't get what productivity actually is. If it is GDP per hour then it might be that we just have a lot of low paid service industry jobs.

The stupid h&s seem to exist more in the papers than reality.

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and its wrong.

H. L. Mencken

In pretty much every company I have worked for, it isn't the mythical government dictated red tape and bureaucracy that has limited productivity, but the internal policies and processes.

Weak management who don't trust their employees and don't understand how to elucidate successfully operating departments and organisations, place ridiculous measurement and sla's that inhibit actual work but create pretty powerpoint presentations.

El-bent - Member

Very simple.

It is. For an idiot.

MSP - Member
... but the internal policies and processes.

Yes, that's one of the problem too but then they will perish if they maintain such culture.

For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and its wrong.

H. L. Mencken

It is only wrong if you do not try.

If you want more productivity, share more of the revenue with the workers rather than taking it off the top and giving it to the share holders or shovelling more into your own pockets and whinging that [i]they[/i] are not working hard enough.

Would be my advice to any bosses moaning about it.

Can't imagine there's really much the govt can do to influence it.

On the basis that by this measure France is more productive than the UK we can't blame red tape and bureaucracy. On the basis that France comes above us by this measure I think it is BS. My company deals with a lot of French suppliers and companies and there is no way they are more productive than us, what with their 2hr lunches, early finishes, summer shut-downs and the odd strike/go slow thrown in for good measure. they are often letting us down and are by far amongst the worst suppliers we deal with. There must be other industry sectors in France that are making up for the lackies we deal with.

I don't think productivity is simply lazy workers. That's not quite what it means.. How dk they define this headline productivity figure?

Exactly. The TV,papers and radio never say.

If you want more productivity, share more of the revenue with the workers rather than taking it off the top and giving it to the share holders or shovelling more into your own pockets and whinging that they are not working hard enough.

It might encourage workers to reduce their working week improving health and general wellbeing which would probably lead to increased productivity per person. Take up any requirement to cover the loss of man-hours by employing more people, putting money in more peoples' pockets thus stimulating the economy, collecting more tax and reducing outgoings on benefits.

Economic productivity in this measure is total economic output dvided by manpower input hours, days, wte whatever.

Lower productivity is more likely to be due to the value of the production thAn how hard the workers graft. If you grow potatoes you aren're going to make as much as someone producing cutting edge tech no matter how hard you work. The reason France is more productive is that they have a higher value, higher skilled, higher tech economy. Investment in education training research innovation technology infrastructure is the answer not further cutting workers rights.

It really f###s me off how it's reported in the media

I thought we were supposed to be strong in high tech..?

It is the average across the whole economy. Centres of high tech h excellence watered down by loads of low value service sector work. I also think the French, Germans etc also think they are good at high tech, and are told that by their media.

Some on the radio said that working people benefits hurt this figure as it leaves lots of people doing 15 hours per week max. Something like that

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32827317 ]bbc linky[/url]

Don't completely agree with this but better than the usual lazy british worker nonsense

I bet half the people here dont know what productivity is and dont know how to measure it

Anyone claiming low productivity is due to red tape and working hours directives really doesn't know what productivity is.

Productivity is simply the amount produced by the hours worked to produce it. Work less and produce the same and productivity goes up, work the same and produce more and productivity goes up. Simple.

Working more and producing more may create growth but it doesn't improve productivity. And this type of growth isn't really that great.

Why is this important?

"By Thursday lunchtime the other countries have produced as much as it takes us to produce by Friday afternoon when we knock off work.
"So basically we could take every Friday off if we could be as productive as those other countries and earn the same amount of money."

What can we do about it?

to really deal with low productivity we will have to improve education, skills, investment, infrastructure and management. Just solving one or two factors is probably not going to be enough.
It seems we might just have to get used to those long hours.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32827317

Fixed link..

I thought we were supposed to be strong in high tech..?

Not as strong as Germany and France. In Europe, engineers or scientists can go and do a postgraduate for next to nothing. Here we have a postgraduate system geared to make money from/be supported by international students, it brings money into the country but does nothing to develop a native skill base when we are charging students 10-20 grand a pop for a masters.

Instead we will blame working time directives, red tape and benefits for the issue - whilst simultaneously decrying the increasing levels of higher education that we are witnessing (lazy students, polytechnic hate, "get a real job", "too many clueless graduates" etc etc). When in fact we are lagging behind many other countries in this respect.

Increase the output prices, which would boost GDP. Simple 🙂

I'm not sure if this would really impact on productivity the way it's measured but the most productive I've ever been has been either working in a small company with a focussed, hard-working, highly skilled team or on my own managing and delivering a project entirely myself...

The least productive is in the corporate environment with dire leadership, unclear objectives, decision by committee, bullying and manipulation and politics. I've seen some really good people utterly wasted through lousy management.

Culturally I think UK corporates are totally in the wrong place... quite a few of my most ambitious friends are basically cruising after 20 years of work, having grown so tired of all the political nonsense - we'd all love to work really hard but have come to the conclusion it's not worth it in the cultures in which we work. Maybe the fact we're in financial services has something to do with it!

I suspect some cultural change would help...

Maybe the fact we're in financial services has something to do with it!

Nah, It's the same in my sector.

We are currently doing a project where half of it is being delivered by the French (who have employed a single UK based expert consultant) and the other half is being delivered by a UK based team who have farmed out most of the work to India. The UK team have an expensive expert who spends all his time managing politics therefore wastes huge amounts of time achieving nothing and failing to manage the issues caused by working with offshore teams, he then has a few UK based people who are less knowledgeable (and poorly trained/educated) than him and the Indians to pick up the work he can't do because he is in charge and managing everyone else (badly). The French give a tiny bit of oversight, have empowered their expert to get the job done and support him where needed.

Guess who is being more productive and is better value for money.

We also have much nicer lunches when we go to France!

Very simple.

1. Cut bureaucracy.
Very Subjective, what in particular?
2. Get rid of local councils or make it tiny as most are non-productive.
What should a council do? What should be cut? Roads? Education? Planning?
3. Make it easier to start new company.
Takes a few hours at most
4. Set up special low tax light industry zones in all region.
Even if there is demand for the space?
5. Get rid of some of the stoopid H&S shite.
Ah productivity rises by sending your workers to hospital of leaving you open to being sued for long term health damage
6. Reduce the business rate in regions/areas.
A good idea so long as companies are compelled to stay beyond the discount period - see mobile phone plans
7. Reduce the council tax by 40%-50% (you can if the councils are tiny).
You still don't identify what 50% of services you will cut
8. Reduce oversea aid/bribes by 50%.
Seems very punitive? You want to punish some really poor people and hope it makes the UK more productive?
9. Lower tax for exporting companies.
Do the numbers balance? You have cut loads but not sure if there is capacity to pay more reduced tax to cover it.
10. Make it easy to export ... ya you pride yourself in logistic ...
It's really easy, see that EU go play!
11. Reduce tax of haulage companies.
Come up with more efficient methods of moving goods?
12. Lower tax for manufacturing start up for a period time.
Is manufacturing competitive, most start ups make small profits, re-invest their profits in tax deductible ways so it already happens.

If there was a magic gun with magic bullets...

I'd want to get rid of the Them & Us culture, seen it all the way up organisations - needs to be gone from both sides.
Broader acceptance of improvement and efficiency methods and their success. At the moment it's tagged as job cuts even when it's not. If an organisation is too big then people have to accept that the may need to downsize.
Focus on long term stability over short term incentives that lead people to do things that are unsustainable.
Find the areas to lead not just follow. Renewable energy, smart tech, development and design.
Make it easier for people to access training - fund a lifetime training account for people to access when they need it and encourage people to change to fit the future not cling to the past.
Stop the "Graduates are awesome" mantra, some are but some courses are pointless and employing people with good A-levels and no debt makes a lot more sense.

Or go back to the days of the Empire, conquer the world and turn everything from Brum to the Lakes into work houses.

Stop the "Graduates are awesome" mantra, some are but some courses are pointless and employing people with good A-levels and no debt makes a lot more sense.

If you want a high tech economy then unless companies are willing to implement expensive programs to teach people things like R or Matlab etc, then we need more than just bog standard graduates let alone A-level students (really?). Here's an idea, make university education free like the rest of Europe. Then your graduates won't be laden with debt. We'd rather spend money on silly things like Trident though.

Find the areas to lead not just follow. Renewable energy, smart tech, development and design.

Requires more research scientists and engineers. See previous point.

Make it easier for people to access training - fund a lifetime training account for people to access when they need it and encourage people to change to fit the future not cling to the past.

I assume that means funding post graduate education as well? Not just funding the monkeys to change jobs at 40?

Very true Tom, how many graduates do things like Matlab or R? Not all graduates are the same, not all degree's are equal. Companies can take school leavers and invest in them, giving them training (we could almost call it an apprenticeship) in the areas they need and work with them without trying to send as many people to university as possible. In a high tech economy not everyone needs to be high tech, we still need a wide range of skills some of which are not provided effectivley (content and value for money) by universities. For a part of the population entering work 3-5 years earlier, not having huge debts and gaining good skills on the way should end up with them being well rewarded and being able to compete.

and as the rest of your post seems delayed...

you are linking my graduates comment to only apply to scientists and engineers, it was a much broader comment about the current situation where people seem to think any degree makes them better and employers simply tag "graduate" onto any position that they want then spend months trying to train said green graduate into doing stuff.

Not just funding the monkeys to change jobs at 40?

Sorry Mike, I just get tired of a lot of the anti-graduate/university education types. The UK needs to wake up and smell the coffee in terms of what Asian youngsters are up to.

Some good points there.

Low productivity arises from employers taking on cheap unskilled labour instead of investing. The 'growth' in the economy under Osborne equates to the extra numbers joining the labour force from elsewhere. It never ceases to amaze me how the employer class can persuade so many people that their interests are the same as those of the employees. Consequently we have half-wits decrying eg French workers (check Numbeo for a glimpse of how we compare for costs of living and income etc, 'efficiency' for whom?) and banging on about red tape whereas a completely stripped down neo-liberal economy with a pre-1940 sized welfare state will actually reduce efficiency.
Productive economies nurture and invest in their workers and pay them properly. The current government and sadly many on here are looking in the opposite direction, zero hours, minimum wage and so on. Have we forgotten all that Richard Wilkinson 'Spirit Level' stuff already about inequality driving inefficiency? Unless ST has a disproportionate number of capitalist class followers, so many views here make me think of turkeys and Christmas. The message really is: help the 'economy' by working harder for less. This really is idiot economics.

Have we forgotten all that Richard Wilkinson 'Spirit Level' stuff already about inequality driving inefficiency?

Yeah, I would blame Thatcher but that seems to be akin to resorting to Godwins/Reductio ad Hitlerum.

Just to say that (apart from the obvious nonsense) this thread has been both educational and very interesting.

🙂

Remember when Philip Green paid himself a billion pounds bonus, paid to his wife in Monaco, to avoid paying tax. That same year he told the workforce they had to work 2 years longer before they could draw on their (reduced) pensions. These two events are not unrelated.
The CEOs arguing for 'efficiency', 'streamlining', 'cutting the red tape' are precisely the people who mire themselves in guaranteed incomes, guaranteed bonuses even when the firm makes a loss, guaranteed pensions, golden handcuffs etc. Think Sir Fred at RBS. What is the masterstroke is when they persuade their minions to run around arguing that if we all work harder for less money on no guaranteed hours ie greater 'efficiency', then we will be better off. No, THEY will be better off and we will be forked. Workers need to fight their corner, no-one is going to do it for them.

Problem is BillMC is there is no unified "The CEO's" or "The Workers" there are thousands of smaller businesses in the middle ground where the bosses take the risks, put up their money, try and do the best for their workers and the business that provides them with jobs. Places where the boss/owner takes the profit when it's there and rides out the loss when it's not working.

The deal needs to work but pitting one against the other in the tribal them and us doesn't seem to have worked so far but hey keep trying.

Not just funding the monkeys to change jobs at 40?

Easy tiger, I'm one of those monkeys 👿

To be honest, 90% of my career change training has been through the power of Google and a bit of critical thinking.

Economic productivity in this measure is total economic output dvided by manpower input hours, days, wte whatever.

So its as I thought it our genraly mass of low level low paying economy.

@tom-w1987 I work in a high tech sector. Non of the 99 % of the tasks in jobs I have had require the level of eduction I have. Most could easily be achieved with some good training. R and Matlab are not hard just because it has become a buzzword that recruitment consultants are creaming them self over does not mean shit.

I have less experience of Europe but n.America it is very common for people to have trades or similar and earn very good money. Real knowledge comes from doing real things. We do really get over excited by degrees. Even in the UK some of the best engineers I know have HND level eduction. One designs boats for the olimpics the other decommissioning equipment for nuclear plant.

Are you a public sector worker?

From the man who espouses all problems are caused by Zombie maggots and the only cure is with a shotgun or some other weapon he learned about playing video games, for the love of God shut up.

Public sector has recently been a great example of efficiency savings - look at DVLA, huge savings in the cost of processing road tax and driver Licencing through computerisation and online payments etc.

Not so good for those who lose their jobs though

One can only expect that similar will be seen in other areas of the public sector - tax credits paperwork for example.

Should we avoid making something more efficient because we would be laying off public sector workers though?

[i]for the love of God shut up[/i]

I gave up reading his posts a while ago.

Or how about in my line of work you make so many cuts that we cant actually do our job and now pick and choose (following set criteria) what we deal with. Public get arsey and complain that what we did regularly 2 years ago we don't do now. Well who did you vote for I ask?

edward2000 - Member
I bet half the people here dont know what productivity is and dont know how to measure it

Come on then Edward..........dont hold back !

I gave up reading his posts a while ago.

The CEO's" or "The Workers" there are thousands of smaller businesses in the middle ground where the bosses take the risks, put up their money, try and do the best for their workers and the business that provides them with jobs. Places where the boss/owner takes the profit when it's there and rides out the loss when it's not working.

Indeed and we do need to do something to realise that for every tax avoiding rapacious capitalistic scum dog there are decent folk working hard. i dont think this negates his point

The deal needs to work but pitting one against the other in the tribal them and us doesn't seem to have worked so far but hey keep trying.

@tom-w1987 I work in a high tech sector. Non of the 99 % of the tasks in jobs I have had require the level of eduction I have. Most could easily be achieved with some good training. R and Matlab are not hard just because it has become a buzzword that recruitment consultants are creaming them self over does not mean shit.

My point was, is that they aren't taught at A-level and very few companies are willing to invest resources in teaching youngsters/graduates those programs. If you want to say "well teach them those skills during 16-18 education", then we may as well go the old Filipino route and skip A-levels all together and do a 3-4 year degree from the age of 16. That didn't work out for the Philippines.

In my line of work, there is shit that I really need to go and do a specialized masters in to gain the basic skills for the jobs that I want. Stuff that was either quickly covered or all out skipped entirely during my degree. If I was going more down the laboratory based route, I'd be looking at doing a masters in Germany simply because of the sheer amount of technical skills and lab time that are taught on some of their biotech masters.

Right now though I'm trying to decide between a Statistics masters or Warwick to do Complexity Science.

Even in the UK some of the best engineers I know have HND level eduction.

Engineer pay in the uk is generally regarded as shit isn't it, outside of chemistry engineering anyway? It's funny that in the States, where engineer pay is excellent that most of them go to college/university.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-20034164

Within the group of countries in the wider European education area, it says that apart from England and Wales, the only other countries to have so few home students staying on for postgraduate are [b]Andorra and Kazakhstan[/b]

[img] [/img]

Tom your perspective seems to come from perhaps a limited experience, nobody is saying you don't need that just not everyone does. Engineering covers a lot these days and I've see loads of good HND/apprentice designers working alongside Mech Eng grads. Hard to tell the difference a lot of the time.

My point was, is that they aren't taught at A-level and very few companies are willing to invest resources in teaching youngsters/graduates those programs.

Every new programme I used I was trained by work at some stage (or self taught), I'm off to Utah for a week later in the year to do more. A chunk of my income also comes from teaching specific software to people in business. Those with a masters had they learnt it at Uni would be 3-4 years behind in my field by the time they got their first job.

If I needed some matlab/r work doing I'd probably just hire a contractor for the specifics much quicker and probably a very good quality output.

If you think pay in the US is better go for it, probably sell the bikes first as you wont get much time off and all that better pay will probably cover your health insurance.

I'm not saying no post school eduction but that hndlevel and advanced aprentaships would be enough if well targeted.
P.s I'd do the stats if I were youbut make sure you do a module in probability theory. Again how much of your masters you use once in industry will be debatable but it might get you a job!

If you think pay in the US is better go for it, probably sell the bikes first as you wont get much time off and all that better pay will probably cover your health insurance.

The USA's waorkforce is more productive than us.

So although their culture is to work hard (Texan suppliers fail Euro company supplier audits designed to stop exploitative labour practices in Asia!) they don't need to. Collectively they could work less and still have the same standard of living that we do.

(Their healthcare system is the most expensive in the world though)