How Sickness Absence and Presenteeism Influence Income: Empirical Evidence from the EWCS 2015

Sickness absences possess severe impacts on company productivity. Existing research shows that firms also face productivity losses if employees show up at the workplace despite being sick, a phenomenon called presenteeism. This sparks the discussion of whether employees should stay at home and cure themselves or whether they should still turn up at the work-place. Using data from the European Working Conditions Survey 2015 we find that sickness absence and presenteeism relate positively to employees’ salaries. However, looking only at employees with wages depending upon the company performance, we show that those taking sick leaves possess lower incomes than those not taking sick leaves while no effects of presenteeism on income seem to exist. Based on our findings we advise employers to allow employees with health issues to telework from home as this might hinder the spreading of diseases but at the same time might keep productivity at higher levels.