The researchers found that the negative impact of working at home during free time was particularly high for women.
The COVID-19 pandemic sparked interest in remote work, but research by Duanyi Yang, assistant professor of labor relations, law and history, found mixed findings on the impact of working from home on workers’ well-being and job outlook.
Next in “Working from Home and Worker Wellbeing: New Evidence from Germany” ILR reviewYang and his co-authors focus on the difference between working from home during regular work hours – which they refer to as replacement work-from-home – and working from home outside of those hours. – what they call extension work-from-home.
Using a survey of 7,857 employees within 814 German establishments, their research found that extended work-from-home is associated with lower psychological well-being, higher turnover intentions and higher conflict between work and family. In contrast, switching to work-from-home resulted in greater engagement, and was not associated with higher work-family conflict or turnover.
Additionally, they found that the expansion of work-from-home has a greater negative impact on women’s well-being and work-family conflict. Specifically, psychological well-being is 11% lower for women who do extension work from home compared to women with similar characteristics who do not work from home.
“Given the evidence that remote work can bring benefits to workers and employers, but only if work from home is limited and not expanded, an important next step is to determine whether new labor standards and management practices will benefit from expanded work.” How can you help protect–home,” Yang said.
For example, she said, in 2016, France passed a law that gives workers the “right to disconnect” from workplace communication devices to ensure work doesn’t spill over into personal time. Similarly, in Australia, large public sector unions are currently bargaining with public employers to include the right to disconnect in upcoming collective bargaining agreements.
Yang said, “In the United States, managers, executives and employee representatives also have opportunities to counteract implicit ‘always-on’ expectations and develop new norms that allow for remote work and clear boundaries between work and family life.” Welcomes.” “In the context of a tighter labor market, employers may be more open to encouraging temporary layoffs to avoid employee burnout and limit turnover.”
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