Mental health and labour productivity

Abstract

We present novel evidence of the effect of mental health on productivity using a direct measure of productivity from the COVID-19 modules of the UK Household Longitudinal Study. We employ spatial variation in COVID-19 deaths as an instrumental variable and supplement results by computing bounds by considering coefficient stability to observable factors to infer the influence of unobservables. Our findings reveal a substantive positive relationship between poor mental health and decreased productivity. Our estimates suggest productivity losses of around 54 min per week (on average) for individuals who report a decline in mental health.

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Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Rice, N. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0312-823X Roberts, J. https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2883-7251 Sechel, C. https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8653-3443
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information:	© 2025 The Authors. Except as otherwise noted, this author-accepted version of a journal article published in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization is made available via the University of Sheffield Research Publications and Copyright Policy under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Dates:	Submitted: 18 October 2024 Accepted: 15 May 2025 Published (online): 21 June 2025 Published: August 2025
Institution:	The University of Sheffield
Academic Units:	The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Economics (Sheffield)
Depositing User:	Symplectic Sheffield
Date Deposited:	23 Jun 2025 10:49
Last Modified:	23 Jun 2025 10:49
Status:	Published
Publisher:	Elsevier BV
Refereed:	Yes
Identification Number:	10.1016/j.jebo.2025.107075
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID):	oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:228216

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Mental health and labour productivity

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