Productivity can be improved by:

A. increasing inputs while holding outputs steady.

B. decreasing outputs while holding inputs steady.

C. increasing inputs and outputs in the same proportion.

D. decreasing inputs while holding outputs steady.

E. None of these

Answer: D. Decreasing inputs while holding outputs steady

Explanation: Productivity is the efficient use of resources (labour, capital, personnel, land, materials, energy, information etc.) in the production of goods and services. It is also a measure of the efficiency of an industry, a person, a machine, a system and so on, in converting inputs into useful outputs. When more is accomplished (higher output) with the same amount of resources as inputs or even lesser amounts, it means we have increasing productivity. Calculating productivity is done by taking ratio of outputs produced to the inputs used in production.

Productivity = Output / Input

From this, when the denominator (input) decreases and the numerator (output) stays the same, the fraction (productivity) as a whole increases. So it can also be inferred mathematically, why this happens and therefore option D is accurate.