IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hhs/gunwpe/0047.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Long-Term Absenteeism Due To Sickness: The Swedish Experience, 1986-1991

Author

Listed:
  • Andrén, Daniela

    (Department of Economics, School of Economics and Commercial Law, Göteborg University)

Abstract

Long-term absenteeism due to sickness has been increasing in the past two decades. This has raised many questions about causes, financing, and policy measures to prevent further increases. Answering these questions is even more important in a society with an aging population, which is expected to record even more cases. With data from the Swedish National Insurance Board, proportional hazards models for multiple spells are used in this study to account for shared unobserved group-level characteristics (or frailty) associated with long-term sickness. When the spells were grouped by individual,diagnosis or region, there were significant positive random effects. There was "more" heterogeneity among diagnosis-groups and individual-groups than among regions as groups. Both individual and labor market characteristics had significant effects on the length of absence, which suggests policies aimed to prevent and slow down the increasing trend of long-term sickness of those in older age-groups, but also special policies orientated to prevent deterioration of health status of younger employees.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrén, Daniela, 2001. "Long-Term Absenteeism Due To Sickness: The Swedish Experience, 1986-1991," Working Papers in Economics 47, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:gunwpe:0047
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.handels.gu.se/epc/data/html/pages/PDF/gunwpe0047.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David Armstrong, 1999. "Hidden Male Unemployment in Northern Ireland," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(6), pages 499-511.
    2. Devine, Theresa J. & Kiefer, Nicolas M., 1991. "Empirical Labor Economics: The Search Approach," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195059366.
    3. Paringer, Lynn, 1983. "Women and Absenteeism: Health or Economics?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 73(2), pages 123-127, May.
    4. Johnson, William G & Ondrich, Jan, 1990. "The Duration of Post-injury Absences from Work," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 72(4), pages 578-586, November.
    5. Brown, Sarah & Sessions, John G, 1996. "The Economics of Absence: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(1), pages 23-53, March.
    6. Donna B. Gilleskie, 1998. "A Dynamic Stochastic Model of Medical Care Use and Work Absence," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(1), pages 1-46, January.
    7. Dunn, L F & Youngblood, Stuart A, 1986. "Absenteeism as a Mechanism for Approaching an Optimal Labor Market Equilibrium: An Empirical Study," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 68(4), pages 668-674, November.
    8. Fenn, Paul T, 1981. "Sickness Duration, Residual Disability, and Income Replacement: An Empirical Analysis," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 91(361), pages 158-173, March.
    9. Christina Beatty & Stephen Fothergill, 1996. "Labour Market Adjustment in Areas of Chronic Industrial Decline: The Case of the UK Coalfields," Regional Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(7), pages 627-640.
    10. Disney, Richard & Webb, Steven, 1991. "Why Are There So Many Long Term Sick in Britain?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 101(405), pages 252-262, March.
    11. Chelius, James R., 1981. "Understanding absenteeism: The potential contribution of economic theory," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 9(4), pages 409-418, December.
    12. Mohammed Chaudhury & Ignace Ng, 1992. "Absenteeism Predictors: Least Squares, Rank Regression, and Model Selection Results," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 25(3), pages 615-635, August.
    13. Butler, Richard J & Worrall, John D, 1985. "Work Injury Compensation and the Duration of Nonwork Spells," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 95(379), pages 714-724, September.
    14. Knutsson, Anders & Goine, Hans, 1998. "Occupation and unemployment rates as predictors of long term sickness absence in two Swedish counties," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 25-31, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Andrén, Daniela, 2004. "Why Are The Sickness Absences So Long In Sweden," Working Papers in Economics 137, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    2. Andrén, Daniela & Granlund, David, 2010. ""Waiting for the other shoe to drop": waiting for health care and duration of sick leave," HUI Working Papers 40, HUI Research.
    3. Andrén, Daniela, 2001. "Short-Term Absenteeism Due To Sickness: The Swedish Experience, 1986 - 1991," Working Papers in Economics 46, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    4. Zhang, Xuelin, 2007. "Gender Differences in Quits and Absenteeism in Canada," Analytical Studies Branch Research Paper Series 2007296e, Statistics Canada, Analytical Studies Branch.
    5. Zhang, Xuelin, 2007. "Differences entre les sexes relativement aux departs volontaires et a l'absenteisme au Canada," Direction des études analytiques : documents de recherche 2007296f, Statistics Canada, Direction des études analytiques.
    6. Gilleskie, Donna, 2010. "Work absences and doctor visits during an illness episode: The differential role of preferences, production, and policies among men and women," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 156(1), pages 148-163, May.
    7. Moral De Blas, Alfonso & Corrales-Herrero, Helena & Martín-Román, Ángel, 2012. "Glass Ceiling or Slippery Floors? Understanding Gender Differences in the Spanish Worker’s Compensation System/¿Techo de cristal o suelo resbaladizo? Comprendiendo las diferencias de género en el sist," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 30, pages 311-340, Abril.
    8. García-Serrano, Carlos & Malo, Miguel A., 2009. "The impact of union direct voice on voluntary and involuntary absenteeism," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 372-383, March.
    9. Drakopoulos, Stavros A. & Grimani, Aikaterini, 2011. "The relationship between absence from work and job satisfaction: Greece and UK comparisons," MPRA Paper 30990, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Lusine Lusinyan & Leo Bonato, 2007. "Work Absence in Europe," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 54(3), pages 475-538, July.
    11. Heywood, John S. & Jirjahn, Uwe & Wei, Xiangdong, 2008. "Teamwork, monitoring and absence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(3-4), pages 676-690, December.
    12. Spierdijk, Laura & van Lomwel, Gijsbert & Peppelman, Wilko, 2009. "The determinants of sick leave durations of Dutch self-employed," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(6), pages 1185-1196, December.
    13. Christian Pfeifer, 2010. "Impact of wages and job levels on worker absenteeism," International Journal of Manpower, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 31(1), pages 59-72, March.
    14. Garcia-Serrano, Carlos & A. Malo, Miguel, 2008. "The influence of disability on absenteeism: an empirical analysis using Spanish data," ISER Working Paper Series 2008-29, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    15. Andersen, Signe Hald, 2010. "The cost of sickness: On the effect of the duration of sick leave on post-sick leave earnings," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 70(10), pages 1581-1589, May.
    16. Galizzi, Monica & Boden, Leslie I., 2003. "The return to work of injured workers: evidence from matched unemployment insurance and workers' compensation data," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 10(3), pages 311-337, June.
    17. Sarah Brown & Fathi Fakhfakh & John G. Sessions, 1999. "Absenteeism and Employee Sharing: An Empirical Analysis Based on French Panel Data, 1981–1991," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 52(2), pages 234-251, January.
    18. Andrén, Daniela, 2004. "“Never on a Sunday”: Economic Incentives and Sick Leave in Sweden," Working Papers in Economics 136, University of Gothenburg, Department of Economics.
    19. repec:lan:wpaper:2935 is not listed on IDEAS
    20. Cédric Afsa & Pauline Givord, 2009. "Le rôle des conditions de travail dans les absences pour maladie : le cas des horaires irréguliers," Économie et Prévision, Programme National Persée, vol. 187(1), pages 83-103.
    21. Fortin, B. & Lanoie, P., 1998. "Effects of Workers' Compensation : A Survey," Papers 9816, Laval - Recherche en Politique Economique.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    long-term sickness; absenteeism; multiple spells; unobserved heterogeneity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J20 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - General
    • J30 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - General
    • J70 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Labor Discrimination - - - General

    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:hhs:gunwpe:0047. 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: Ann-Christin Räätäri Nyström (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/naiguse.html .

    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.