 What cannot be cured must be endured: The long-lasting effect of a COVID-19 infection on workplace productivityKai Fischer, J Reade and Wolfgang Schmal Labour Economics, 2022, vol. 79, issue C Abstract: The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered economic shock waves across the globe. Exploiting a natural experiment, this paper estimates how being infected with the virus shapes individual-level productivity after having recovered. Studying the performance of professional athletes in Germany and Italy and applying a staggered difference-in-differences design, we find that individual performance drops by around 6 percent after a previously infected athlete returns to the pitch. This striking deterioration remains persistent over time – amounting to 5% eight months after the infection. The effect increases with age and infection severity, and is spread disproportionally over the course of a match. We detect no productivity effects for other respiratory infections. We take these findings as first evidence that the pandemic might cause long-lasting effects on worker productivity and economic growth. Keywords: Labor productivity; Economic costs of COVID-19; Public health (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:labeco:v:79:y:2022:i:c:s0927537122001713 DOI: 10.1016/j.labeco.2022.102281 Access Statistics for this article Labour Economics is currently edited by A. Ichino More articles in Labour Economics from Elsevier |
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