IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cep/cepdps/dp2036.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Not incentivized yet efficient: Working from home in the public sector

Author

Listed:
  • Alessandra Fenizia
  • Tom Kirchmaier

Abstract

This paper studies whether working from home (WFH) affects workers' performance in public sector jobs. Studying public sector initiatives allows us to establish baseline estimates on the impact of WFH net of incentives. Exploiting novel administrative data and plausibly exogenous variation in work location, we find that WFH increases productivity by 12%. These productivity gains are primarily driven by reduced distractions. They are not explained by differences in quality, shift length, or task allocation. The productivity gains more than double when tasks are assigned by the supervisor.

Suggested Citation

  • Alessandra Fenizia & Tom Kirchmaier, 2024. "Not incentivized yet efficient: Working from home in the public sector," CEP Discussion Papers dp2036, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    • Handle: RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp2036
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/dp2036.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Prithwiraj (Raj) Choudhury & Cirrus Foroughi & Barbara Larson, 2021. "Work‐from‐anywhere: The productivity effects of geographic flexibility," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(4), pages 655-683, April.
    2. Natalia Emanuel & Emma Harrington & Amanda Pallais, 2023. "The Power of Proximity to Coworkers: Training for Tomorrow or Productivity Today?," NBER Working Papers 31880, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Oriana Bandiera & Iwan Barankay & Imran Rasul, 2009. "Social Connections and Incentives in the Workplace: Evidence From Personnel Data," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(4), pages 1047-1094, July.
    4. Nicholas Bloom & Ruobing Han & James Liang, 2022. "How Hybrid Working From Home Works Out," NBER Working Papers 30292, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Cevat Giray Aksoy & Jose Maria Barrero & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis & Mathias Dolls & Pablo Zarate, 2022. "Working from Home Around the World," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 53(2 (Fall)), pages 281-360.
    6. Diego Battiston & Jordi Blanes i Vidal & Tom Kirchmaier, 2021. "Face-to-Face Communication in Organizations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(2), pages 574-609.
    7. Battiston, Diego Ezequiel & Blanes I Vidal, Jordi & Kirchmaier, Tom & Szemeredi, Katalin, 2023. "Peer pressure and manager pressure in organisations," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121319, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    8. Kandel, Eugene & Lazear, Edward P, 1992. "Peer Pressure and Partnerships," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(4), pages 801-817, August.
    9. Nicholas Bloom & James Liang & John Roberts & Zhichun Jenny Ying, 2015. "Does Working from Home Work? Evidence from a Chinese Experiment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 130(1), pages 165-218.
    10. David Silver, 2021. "Haste or Waste? Peer Pressure and Productivity in the Emergency Department [The Determinants of Productivity in Medical Testing: Intensity and Allocation of Care]," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 88(3), pages 1385-1417.
    11. Alexandre Mas & Amanda Pallais, 2019. "Alternative Work Arrangements," Working Papers 634, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    12. Alexandre Mas & Amanda Pallais, 2020. "Alternative Work Arrangements," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 12(1), pages 631-658, August.
    13. Steffen Künn & Christian Seel & Dainis Zegners, 2022. "Cognitive Performance in Remote Work: Evidence from Professional Chess," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 132(643), pages 1218-1232.
    14. Joshua D. Angrist & Jörn-Steffen Pischke, 2009. "Mostly Harmless Econometrics: An Empiricist's Companion," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 8769.
    15. Achyuta Adhvaryu & Namrata Kala & Anant Nyshadham, 2022. "Management and Shocks to Worker Productivity," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 130(1), pages 1-47.
    16. José María Barrero & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2023. "The Evolution of Work from Home," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 37(4), pages 23-50, Fall.
    17. David Atkin & Antoinette Schoar & Sumit Shinde, 2023. "Working from Home, Worker Sorting and Development," NBER Working Papers 31515, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Michael Gibbs & Friederike Mengel & Christoph Siemroth, 2023. "Work from Home and Productivity: Evidence from Personnel and Analytics Data on Information Technology Professionals," Journal of Political Economy Microeconomics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 1(1), pages 7-41.
    19. Cevat Giray Aksoy & Jose Maria Barrero & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis & Mathias Dolls & Pablo Zarate, 2022. "Working from Home Around the World," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 53(2 (Fall)), pages 281-360.
    20. Natalia Emanuel & Emma Harrington, 2024. "Working Remotely? Selection, Treatment, and the Market for Remote Work," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 16(4), pages 528-559, October.
    21. Dutcher, Glenn & Saral, Krista, 2022. "Remote Work and Team Productivity," MPRA Paper 115253, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    22. Jose Maria Barrero & Nick Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2020. "60 Million Fewer Commuting Hours Per Day: How Americans Use Time Saved by Working from Home," Working Papers 2020-132, Becker Friedman Institute for Research In Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thomas Breda & Paul Dutronc-Postel & Vladimir Pecheu, 2024. "Does Feasibility Explain the Unequal Development of Working From Home?," PSE Working Papers halshs-04777568, HAL.
    2. Thomas Breda & Paul Dutronc-Postel & Vladimir Pecheu, 2024. "Does Feasibility Explain the Unequal Development of Working From Home?," Institut des Politiques Publiques halshs-04777568, HAL.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pablo Zarate & Mathias Dolls & Steven J. Davis & Nicholas Bloom & Jose Maria Barrero & Cevat Giray Aksoy, 2024. "Why Does Working from Home Vary Across Countries and People?," NBER Working Papers 32374, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Michele Mariani & Livia Ristuccia & Pasqualino Montanaro, 2023. "Propensity to work remotely in the Bank of Italy: a behavioural analysis," Questioni di Economia e Finanza (Occasional Papers) 753, Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area.
    3. Vij, Akshay & Souza, Flavio F. & Barrie, Helen & Anilan, V. & Sarmiento, Sergio & Washington, Lynette, 2023. "Employee preferences for working from home in Australia," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 214(C), pages 782-800.
    4. Behrens, Kristian & Kichko, Sergei & Thisse, Jacques-Francois, 2024. "Working from home: Too much of a good thing?," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C).
    5. Guillaume Gueguen & Claudia Senik, 2023. "Adopting telework: The causal impact of working from home on subjective well‐being," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 61(4), pages 832-868, December.
    6. Jirjahn, Uwe & Rienzo, Cinzia, 2024. "Working from Home and Performance Pay: Individual or Collective Payment Schemes?," IZA Discussion Papers 17234, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    7. Burdett, Ashley & Etheridge, Ben & Tang, Li & Wang, Yikai, 2024. "Worker productivity during Covid-19 and adaptation to working from home," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 167(C).
    8. Guillaume M. A. Morlet & Thomas Bolli, 2024. "Working from home is here to stay, but how does it affect workplace learning?," Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics, Springer;Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics, vol. 160(1), pages 1-19, December.
    9. Battiston, Diego Ezequiel & Blanes I Vidal, Jordi & Kirchmaier, Tom & Szemeredi, Katalin, 2023. "Peer pressure and manager pressure in organisations," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121319, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    10. Erdsiek, Daniel & Rost, Vincent, 2023. "How do managers form their expectations about working from home? Survey experiments on the perception of productivity," ZEW Discussion Papers 23-018, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    11. Laura Abrardi & Elena Grinza & Alessandro Manello & Flavio Porta, 2024. "Work from home arrangements and organizational performance in Italian SMEs: evidence from the COVID-19 pandemic," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 67(6), pages 2821-2863, December.
    12. Lee, Kangoh, 2023. "Working from home as an economic and social change: A review," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    13. Bernardus Doornik & Deniz Igan & Enisse Kharroubi, 2023. "Labour markets: what explains the resilience?," BIS Quarterly Review, Bank for International Settlements, December.
    14. Gokan,Toshitaka & Kichko,Sergei & Matheson,Jesse A & Thisse,Jacques-François, 2022. "How the rise of teleworking will reshape labor markets and cities?," IDE Discussion Papers 868, Institute of Developing Economies, Japan External Trade Organization(JETRO).
    15. Sabrina Wulff Pabilonia & Victoria Vernon, 2025. "Remote work, wages, and hours worked in the United States," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 38(1), pages 1-49, March.
    16. Squicciarini, Mara & Juhász, Réka & Voigtländer, Nico, 2020. "Away from Home and Back: Coordinating (Remote) Workers in 1800 and 2020," CEPR Discussion Papers 15578, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Thomas Fackler & Michael Hofmann & Nadzeya Laurentsyeva, 2023. "Defying Gravity: What Drives Productivity in Remote Teams?," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 427, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    18. Masayuki Morikawa, 2024. "Productivity dynamics of work from home: Firm-level evidence from Japan," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 34(2), pages 465-487, April.
    19. Parkhomenko, Andrii & Delventhal, Matthew J, 2023. "Spatial Implications of Telecommuting in the United States," Institute of Transportation Studies, Working Paper Series qt97q6c2rg, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Davis.
    20. Guido Friebel & Matthias Heinz & Miriam Krueger & Nikolay Zubanov, 2017. "Team Incentives and Performance: Evidence from a Retail Chain," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(8), pages 2168-2203, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    working from home; productivity; public sector;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights
    • J45 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Particular Labor Markets - - - Public Sector Labor Markets
    • L23 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Organization of Production
    • M54 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - Labor Management

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cep:cepdps:dp2036. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/publications/discussion-papers/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.