Defining productivity as the complex of factors that determine how efficiently an economy will operate, this booklet for Canadian secondary school students analyzes the subject in five sections. "What Is Productivity?" discusses output/input relationships when producing goods and services. "Why Is Productivity Important?" discusses the role of productivity in decreasing inflation and in improving the standard of living. "What Determines the Level of Productivity?" analyzes factors such as the structure of the economy, the state of the economy, and the scale of operations (the point at which the size of an operation increases and specialization at intermediate stages of the operation becomes profitable). The quality and quantity of capital (equipment used by labor in production), the labor force, and the role of government are also discussed. "Measuring Productivity" deals with problems concerning measurement and the use of statistics. The concluding section outlines the efforts that business, labor, and the government must make to increase economic efficiency in Canada. (KC)