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Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link

Amy Isham Orcid Logo, Simon Mair, Tim Jackson

Ecological Economics, Volume: 184, Start page: 106989

Swansea University Author: Amy Isham Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2021.106989

Abstract

Labour productivity is a key concept for understanding the way modern economies use resources and features prominently in ecological economics. Ecological economists have questioned the desirability of labour productivity growth on both environmental and social grounds. In this paper we aim to contr...

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Published in: Ecological Economics
ISSN: 0921-8009
Published: Elsevier BV 2021
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa61458
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spelling 2022-10-14T16:46:56.1059880 v2 61458 2022-10-06 Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link 5fce1ddf9df54207881ee2541a8e0074 0000-0001-6089-709X Amy Isham Amy Isham true false 2022-10-06 HPS Labour productivity is a key concept for understanding the way modern economies use resources and features prominently in ecological economics. Ecological economists have questioned the desirability of labour productivity growth on both environmental and social grounds. In this paper we aim to contribute to ongoing debates by focusing on the link between labour productivity and worker wellbeing. First, we review the evidence for the happy-productive worker thesis, which suggests labour productivity could be improved by increasing worker wellbeing. Second, we review the evidence on ways that productivity growth may undermine worker wellbeing. We find there is experimental evidence demonstrating a causal effect of worker wellbeing on productivity, but that the relationship can also sometimes involve resource-intensive mediators. Taken together with the evidence of a negative impact on worker wellbeing from productivity growth, we conclude that a relentless pursuit of productivity growth is potentially counterproductive, not only in terms of worker wellbeing, but even in terms of long-term productivity. Journal Article Ecological Economics 184 106989 Elsevier BV 0921-8009 Health; Wellbeing; Productivity; Productivity growth; Workplace factors 1 6 2021 2021-06-01 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2021.106989 COLLEGE NANME Psychology COLLEGE CODE HPS Swansea University The authors gratefully acknowledge financial support from the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) in particular through grant no: ES/M010163/1 which supports the Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity and ES/S015124/1 which supported the project “Powering Productivity”. 2022-10-14T16:46:56.1059880 2022-10-06T13:18:21.2351737 Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences School of Psychology Amy Isham 0000-0001-6089-709X 1 Simon Mair 2 Tim Jackson 3 61458__25462__719c52b8a7a046db8cc057df73c0a7d3.pdf 61458_VoR.pdf 2022-10-14T16:45:37.5816034 Output 867457 application/pdf Version of Record true © 2021 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the CC BY license true eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
title Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
spellingShingle Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
Amy Isham
title_short Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
title_full Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
title_fullStr Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
title_full_unstemmed Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
title_sort Worker wellbeing and productivity in advanced economies: Re-examining the link
author_id_str_mv 5fce1ddf9df54207881ee2541a8e0074
author_id_fullname_str_mv 5fce1ddf9df54207881ee2541a8e0074_***_Amy Isham
author Amy Isham
author2 Amy Isham
Simon Mair
Tim Jackson
format Journal article
container_title Ecological Economics
container_volume 184
container_start_page 106989
publishDate 2021
institution Swansea University
issn 0921-8009
doi_str_mv 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2021.106989
publisher Elsevier BV
college_str Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofmedicinehealthandlifesciences
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofmedicinehealthandlifesciences
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences
department_str School of Psychology{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences{{{_:::_}}}School of Psychology
document_store_str 1
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description Labour productivity is a key concept for understanding the way modern economies use resources and features prominently in ecological economics. Ecological economists have questioned the desirability of labour productivity growth on both environmental and social grounds. In this paper we aim to contribute to ongoing debates by focusing on the link between labour productivity and worker wellbeing. First, we review the evidence for the happy-productive worker thesis, which suggests labour productivity could be improved by increasing worker wellbeing. Second, we review the evidence on ways that productivity growth may undermine worker wellbeing. We find there is experimental evidence demonstrating a causal effect of worker wellbeing on productivity, but that the relationship can also sometimes involve resource-intensive mediators. Taken together with the evidence of a negative impact on worker wellbeing from productivity growth, we conclude that a relentless pursuit of productivity growth is potentially counterproductive, not only in terms of worker wellbeing, but even in terms of long-term productivity.
published_date 2021-06-01T04:20:16Z
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score 11.036684

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