You've made a lot of excellent points jcwren. Although productivity has to be discussed, debated, and quantified by companies or management...I think it's highly difficult to do. I think it's very subjective accordingly to the company, as well as to the manager and the programmers. But with the right company management and coding guidelines/freedom - both company and programmers can be quite productive and happy. Of course, the opposite can be true as well. It sort of reminds me of this...