Measuring public sector productivity: Concepts, challenges and international practices

Orsetta Causa, Maxime Nguyen, Paul Schreyer and Tomomi Tanaka

No 1878, OECD Economics Department Working Papers from OECD Publishing

Abstract: This paper reviews the conceptual foundations, measurement challenges, and emerging international practices in the measurement of public sector productivity. Despite the size and importance of the public sector in OECD economies, measuring its productivity remains considerably more difficult than in market sectors. Public services are usually provided free of charge and lack economically meaningful prices. The paper clarifies the statistical and methodological challenges to measure public sector productivity across countries. It then discusses the principal measurement approaches used in the System of National Accounts, including input-based, output-based, and quality-adjusted output methods, highlighting their respective strengths and limitations. The paper also reviews recent country experiences to improve the measurement of public sector productivity. The analysis concludes that, despite persistent conceptual and comparability challenges, advances in data availability and statistical methods offer significant opportunities to strengthen the measurement of public sector productivity and thereby improve the evidence base for public policy and public expenditure decisions.

Keywords: education; government efficiency; health; National Accounts; non-market output; Public sector productivity; public services; quality adjustment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C82 D24 E01 H11 H50 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-10-23
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oec:ecoaaa:1878-en

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