The Pros and Cons of Sick Pay Schemes: Testing for Contagious Presenteeism and Shirking Behavior

Stefan Pichler () and Nicolas Ziebarth ()

No 15-394, KOF Working papers from KOF Swiss Economic Institute, ETH Zurich

Abstract: This paper proposes a test for the existence and degree of contagious presenteeism and negative externalities in sickness insurance schemes. First, we theoretically decompose moral hazard into shirking and contagious presenteeism behavior and derive testable conditions. Then, we implement the test exploiting German sick pay reforms and administrative industry-level data on certified sick leave by diagnoses. The labor supply adjustment for contagious diseases is significantly smaller than for non-contagious diseases. Lastly, using Google Flu data and the staggered implementation of US sick leave reforms, we show that flu rates decrease after employees gain access to paid sick leave.

Keywords: Sickness Insurance; Paid Sick Leave; Presenteeism; Contagious Diseases; Infections; Negative Externalities; Shirking; US; Germany; KOF-Key-arbeitsmarkt (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 47 pages
Date: 2015-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea, nep-hrm, nep-ias and nep-lma
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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http://dx.doi.org/10.3929/ethz-a-010681869 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: The Pros and Cons of Sick Pay Schemes: Testing for Contagious Presenteeism and Shirking Behavior (2015)
Working Paper: The Pros and Cons of Sick Pay Schemes: Testing for Contagious Presenteeism and Shirking Behavior (2015)
Working Paper: The Pros and Cons of Sick Pay Schemes: Testing for Contagious Presenteeism and Shirking Behavior (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kof:wpskof:15-394

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