What is Productivity? > Output

What is output?

Output is a quantity of goods or services produced in a specific time period (for instance, a year).

For a business producing one good, output could simply be the number of units of that good produced in each time period, such as a month or a year.

The business’s output could also be approximated by the revenues from sales of the product, adjusted for price changes (inflation).

For an industry, output is a measure of all the goods and services produced in a given time period by businesses in that industry and sold either to consumers or to businesses outside that industry.

For example, output can be the number of tons of sugar or boxes of cookies produced in a year by a business or industry.

These products can be measured in terms of dollar value so that different outputs—such as tons of sugar and boxes of cookies—can be combined using the same unit of measurement.

Output can be consumed directly or sold to other businesses for use in producing other output. For example, sugar can be consumed or can be used for further production in making cookies.