I always love seeing statistics like these. According to a U.N. report, workers in the U.S. lead the world in productivity. The report’s statistics conclude that Americans stay at work longerand produce more per person than any other country, and and get more done per hour than anyone except Norwegians.

The average American worker generates $63,885 of wealth per year, according to the report. (Ireland comes in second, then Luxembourg, Belgium and France.) The number is derived by dividing a nation’s gross domestic product by the number of people employed in that country.

My glee at these numbers is not because of gloating rights over my global friends, but because it reveals the lie behind the gloom-and-doom lost productivity “research” thrown around by companies like Websense (which sells the software to block employee access to the Net). A typical Websense study claims workers using the Net for personal reasons cost U.S. businesses $178 billion each year. Then there’s Challenger, Gray & Christmas, an employment consultancy, which argues that the average fantasy football player spends 5.2 hours online per week, accounting for lost productivity nationwide of $435 million. And everybody’s been reading similar studies hastily thrown together showing just how much damage Facebook is causing in the workplace as employees spend all day looking at friends’ profiles instead of getting their work done.

And yet, somehow, despite all these many alleged body blows to worker productivity, the average American worker cranks out $63,885 of wealth, better than any other country. How is this paradox possible? How can the U.S. boast the best worker productivity in the world while worker productivity is simultaneously going into the toilet because of employee use of the web?

The answer is simple: The claims from the web security world are self-serving crap. One reason Americans put in more hours is because they know they have to get their work done, even if they’ve spent some work time engaged online in personal activities. And neither the U.N. nor the U.S. Department of Labor productivity numbers account for the amount of time people spend engaged in work when they’re away from the office.

(On a related note, a recent U.K. study revealed that the Facebook turmoil is a tempest in a teacup: finding that only 17% of Facebook users log into the site from work at all, only 4% log on more than four times per day, and only 2% use Facebook at work for more than 10 hours per week. And yet companies, caving into the fearmongers, continue to block employee access to the site.)

I’ve been very vocal for a long time about my opposition to blocking employee access to the Net. The consequences aren’t supported by the facts, potential abuse can be handled by exception, and the benefits (high levels of employee engagement, access to a broader range of knowledge, improved job satisfaction, a recruiting advantage) should be obvious to anyone who stops and thinks about them. But I’m getting fed up enough with the fearmongers that I’m getting ready to take this to another level. Stay tuned.

Update: On the Facebook front, Tony Molloy sends along a link to an episode of a podcast from an international lawfirm that focuses on the employee/employer Facebook standoff. It’s well-balanced 11 minutes.