Kształtowanie wydajności pracy w Polsce na początku XXI wieku

Labour productivity is a key factor of economic growth and change in living standards and plays an important role as a measure of the competitiveness of countries. Both the increase and decrease in productivity affects the functioning of all forms of economic activity. The lack of awareness of this fact may have a negative effect on the fate of investments. This is particularly evident in the case of industrial companies. The purpose of this article was to examine the external and internal determinants defining performance in Poland and the analysis and evaluation of selected countries. The period under research was 2001–2014, although at times this time period was extended to earlier years or shortened, depending on the availability of data. Analysis of theoretical and empirical research results both for EU and OECD countries has shown that awareness of the direction in which productivity is moving, is essential for the functioning of national economies. Productivity can be moulded, so it is important to understand that it is dependent on the conditions offered by the employer. It is difficult to explicitly specify its degree of impact. Any change positive or negative experienced by employees will have a larger or smaller effect on productivity. In the analysed period, it was found that there is a high productivity in Poland; however, this is not equivalent to high value of goods produced by workers. Despite the apparent significant improvement in the indicators since 1989, Poland has a long way to go before levelling with the richest countries in the European Union and the OECD