zlacker

The numbers are in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) USD so they already measure how many goods in the local market basket can be bought per working hour (on average, as these GDP numbers don’t account for income or wealth distribution).

>>tobero+(OP)
For healthcare it might be getting to the point where the numbers are nearly incomparable. PPP seems like it'd be more inappropriate than usual for measuring a particular industry. US healthcare is known to be quirky.

Although there doesn't seem to be any obvious evidence here that the US could be lagging behind. Per-person the US is still a bit of a productivity outlier to the upside. When they aren't legislatively restrained they tend to work hard and in an organised way.