NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - Productivity, the amount of worker output per hour, is the kind of government report that's hard to get excited about.

We know we are a highly productive lot. Don't nearly all of us work hours we don't get compensated for in the form of breaks not taken or work taken home from the office? That creates worker output per hour that companies don't have to pay for, and helps boost productivity overall.

One of the most important numbers in the productivity report (today's of course is revised third quarter productivity) is the unit labor cost number, the amount of worker wages and benefits companies pay per unit of output.

That number was very tame in the third quarter, negative in fact, because productivity is still pretty high.

A separate survey of CFO's show that the vast majority do not intend to pay bigger wage increases or bonuses next year. This means that most of our increased productivity is boosting profits, not wages.

Will all this reassure the inflation fighters at the Fed? Let's hope so. Low inflation is great. But bigger paychecks in a growing economy are great too and the Fed has to keep the balance going.

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Kathleen Hays is economics correspondent for CNN. Read more of her columns here.