Homeworking hours, rewards and opportunities in the UK: 2011 to 2020
Office for National Statistics (19.04.21)
This article looks at how different propensities of homeworking impact an individual’s job outcomes and explores the characteristics of those who work from home. The unprecedented increase in homeworking in 2020, driven by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, has led many to consider the implications for this on productivity, and other labour market related outcomes. In this research we use objective indicators related to productivity that are consistent before and during the pandemic.
Our analysis is different to other published research in two main ways. First, it doesn’t rely on self-reported measures of productivity, as are often used in research into the effects of homeworking on productivity in 2020. These rely on the workers’ perceptions of productivity, which may not align with economic and statistical measures. Second, we use metrics that can be measured before and during the pandemic. Many other studies have survey data from either before the pandemic, or during the pandemic, but rarely both. This aims to improve our understanding of the wider impact of homeworking on the economy and aggregate labour market.