Using a novel German linked employer–employee dataset, we provide unique evidence about the consequences of working from home (WfH) on individual health and well-being. During the recent pandemic, this locational flexibility measure has been used extensively to promote health by hampering the spread of the virus and to secure jobs. However, its direct theoretical ambiguous effects on health and well-being as characterized by different potential channels have barely been empirically investigated to date despite WfH’s increasing popularity in the years before the pandemic. To address concerns about selection into WfH in our dataset that is unaffected by the COVID-19 shock, our analysis relies on an identification strategy ruling out confounding effects by time-invariant unobservable variables. Moreover, we explain the remaining (intertemporal) variation in the individual WfH status by means of an instrumental variable strategy using variation in equipment with mobile devices among establishments. We find that subjective measures of individual health are partly affected by WfH, whereas no corresponding effect is present for an objective measure of individual health. In terms of individual well-being, we find that WfH leads to considerable improvement. By addressing the potential heterogeneity in our effect of interest, we find that men and middle-aged individuals particularly benefit from WfH.

使用新颖的德国关联雇主-雇员数据集，我们提供了关于在家工作 (WfH) 对个人健康和福祉的影响的独特证据。在最近的大流行期间，这种地点灵活性措施已被广泛使用，以通过阻止病毒传播来促进健康并确保就业。然而，尽管 WfH 在大流行前几年越来越受欢迎，但其以不同潜在渠道为特征的对健康和福祉的直接理论模糊影响迄今为止几乎没有经过实证研究。为了解决对不受 COVID-19 冲击影响的数据集中选择 WfH 的担忧，我们的分析依赖于一种识别策略，排除了时不变的不可观察变量的混杂影响。此外，我们通过使用机构间移动设备设备差异的工具变量策略来解释个体 WfH 状态的剩余（跨期）差异。我们发现，个人健康的主观衡量标准部分受到 WfH 的影响，而个人健康的客观衡量标准则不存在相应的影响。就个人福祉而言，我们发现 WfH 带来了相当大的改善。通过解决我们兴趣影响的潜在异质性，我们发现男性和中年人特别受益于 WfH。