Productivity is a measure of economic efficiency which shows how effectively economic inputs are converted into output. Productivity is measured by comparing the amount of goods and services produced with the inputs which were used in production. Labor productivity is the ratio of the output of goods and services to the labor hours devoted to the production of that output.
Labor is an easily-identified input to virtually every production process.
In terms of cost, it represents about two-thirds of the value produced. BLS productivity measures are based on aggregate national measures of outputs and inputs. These data sources do not provide the information BLS would need to construct occupational or state measures. There are also conceptual obstacles to disaggregating these national measures. For example, the output of a factory may require both white collar and blue collar inputs, and it is therefore unclear how to allocate the output to the two groups separately.