{"id":11813,"date":"2026-01-22T20:38:00","date_gmt":"2026-01-22T19:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rivistaeco.com\/?p=11813"},"modified":"2026-01-22T20:38:00","modified_gmt":"2026-01-22T19:38:00","slug":"a-bad-atmosphere-is-hanging-over-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rivistaeco.com\/en\/2026\/01\/22\/a-bad-atmosphere-is-hanging-over-work\/","title":{"rendered":"A Bad Atmosphere Is Hanging Over Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

Climate change is also affecting workplaces. Not by chance, this summer, agreements and ordinances were introduced to protect workers from extreme heat, providing for breaks and limits on activity during the sunniest hours. <\/em>Much less attention surrounds another threat, more silent but no less serious: air pollution. It has consequences not only for health, but also for people\u2019s physical and cognitive abilities and, consequently, for their productivity and safety while performing their jobs. Indeed, on days when air quality is worse, accidents among delivery riders increase. <\/em>Measures are therefore needed to complement long-term strategies to reduce emissions with immediate interventions to improve conditions in offices, factories, and schools as well. Because polluted air must be treated as an occupational risk.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Climate change is also transforming the reality of work. Increasingly frequent heat waves make it clear that long-term policies to reduce emissions are not sufficient: immediate measures are also needed to protect workers while they carry out their duties.<\/p>\n

Some Action Against Heat, None for Air Quality<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Some measures to protect workers from the effects of sharply rising temperatures have already been introduced in several European countries. In Belgium, for example, the law provides for mandatory interventions\u2014such as the use of fans or longer breaks\u2014when perceived temperature exceeds certain thresholds, which vary according to the type of activity performed. In Spain, workers can take paid climate leave, while in Italy many regions have issued ordinances limiting exposure to extreme heat in certain sectors, such as agriculture and construction, banning work during the hottest hours of the day.<\/p>\n

In short, while policymakers tend to move slowly when it comes to adopting structural measures to tackle climate change, they react more quickly when it comes to protecting workers from extreme heat, albeit through still partial interventions that are not always extended to all categories.<\/p>\n

However, the attention devoted to heat is not matched when it comes to another threat, more silent but equally serious: air pollution. Researchers in the field often note the public\u2019s surprise when they explain that air quality concerns not only the most vulnerable people, but the entire population. Its effects extend to apparently distant dimensions: from students\u2019 cognitive abilities to workers\u2019 productivity, and to the risk of road and workplace accidents.<\/p>\n

Pollution Harms Work<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In recent years, economic research has documented the negative effects of air pollution in an increasingly convincing way. Several studies show that even relatively low levels\u2014well below current legal limits\u2014not only harm health, but can reduce workers\u2019 performance and, consequently, affect their well-being and earnings, as well as those of the firms that employ them.<\/p>\n

These consequences have been observed in a wide variety of contexts: from manual and physical jobs, such as agricultural or manufacturing work, to activities requiring concentration and mental alertness. Evidence concerns routine tasks, such as customer assistance in call centers, as well as cognitively complex tasks, such as computer programming or judges\u2019 decisions. Even sports performance and the ability to make strategic decisions in competitive contexts worsen when air quality declines, as shown by recent studies on chess players. Similar research has also highlighted effects on school performance.<\/p>\n

The effects do not concern productivity alone, but also labor force participation and workplace safety. Recent studies conducted in Mexico City and in Italy show that when pollution reaches particularly high levels, absenteeism increases significantly, especially among workers with regular jobs. This finding should not, however, be interpreted as lower vulnerability among irregular workers: simply, lacking contractual protections in case of illness, they have fewer opportunities to be absent. Research based on INAIL data has also highlighted a link between pollution and workplace safety.<\/p>\n

However, studies of this kind still present several limitations: they cover a limited number of sectors and tend to examine effects separately, even though it is clear that absences, productivity, and accidents interact with one another.<\/p>\n

An important question also remains open: to what extent are absences due to an actual deterioration in health, whether perceived by workers or not, and to what extent do they instead represent a deliberate choice to avoid excessive exposure to risk?<\/p>\n

In Polluted Environments, Children Learn Less<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In Italy, air pollution reaches very high levels, well above those recommended by the World Health Organization. According to Legambiente, in 2024, 96% of the urban population was exposed to high concentrations of fine particulate matter. While in much of the country pollution levels are similar to the European average, the Po Valley stands out as one of the most polluted areas in Europe. The reasons for this unenviable record lie not only in heavy industrialization and intensive agricultural activity, but also in the region\u2019s particular topography.<\/p>\n

If all this represents a risk factor for citizens\u2019 health, it also makes Italy a particularly suitable context for studying the effects of pollution on work.<\/p>\n

For example, in a study we conducted with Elena Meschi and Caterina Pavese, we document a negative impact of pollution on primary school students\u2019 results in INVALSI tests. Students exposed to higher pollution levels score lower on questions requiring reasoning and problem-solving skills, while they do not seem to be affected in more memory-based tasks. In the (few) schools equipped with mechanical ventilation systems, negative effects are much weaker.<\/p>\n

And Riders Have More Accidents<\/strong><\/h3>\n

In another recent study, conducted with Tommaso Frattini and Alessio Romarri, we examine the consequences of pollution for a category that has so far been little studied but is particularly exposed: food delivery workers.<\/p>\n

Using detailed data on deliveries, absences, and accidents provided by a food delivery platform, and a strategy that allows us to estimate a causal relationship by exploiting variation in weather conditions, we show that on days with higher pollution levels, riders are absent more often, are slower in making deliveries, and suffer more accidents. The effects are more pronounced among those using bicycles or e-bikes and more limited among those using scooters, indicating that physical effort amplifies the impact of pollution.<\/p>\n

Foreign riders, for whom deliveries represent their main source of income, tend not to be absent even when air quality worsens, but experience sharper declines in productivity. In other words, only those who can afford it avoid exposure; the others continue working in conditions that are harmful to their health. Indeed, on more polluted days, riders tend to extend their shifts to compensate for lower efficiency and maintain the same level of earnings.<\/p>\n

What happens when economic incentives come into play? On days when the air is clean, bonuses work: absences decrease and deliveries become faster. But when pollution increases, the same incentives push workers to operate in unhealthy conditions, consequently increasing the number of accidents.<\/p>\n

What We Can Do to Protect Ourselves<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Given this situation, efforts to improve air quality in the long term must be accompanied by strategies aimed at immediately protecting workers from the effects of pollution. A first step is to strengthen monitoring and guarantee everyone real-time access to information on air quality, for example through automatic alert systems when certain thresholds are exceeded.<\/p>\n

But such data are of little use if awareness is lacking: it is therefore necessary to promote information campaigns that disseminate scientific evidence and raise public awareness.<\/p>\n

At the same time, more direct interventions are needed. Schools and the most exposed workplaces should be equipped with air-conditioning, ventilation, and filtration systems, which are highly effective in protecting students and workers from pollution as well as from heat. In the most extreme cases, when pollution levels exceed critical thresholds, regulations should provide for exceptional measures, such as special leave or other forms of protection for the most exposed workers.<\/p>\n

Ignoring the impact of pollution on work is not only a public health problem, but also an issue of economic efficiency. Protecting workers means protecting productivity. Regulations are needed that recognize exposure to polluted air as an occupational risk, along with adequate tools to reduce its effects.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Simone Ferro is a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Economics of the University of Milan, where he works on health economics, labor economics, and political economy. He worked for two years at the Rodolfo Debenedetti Foundation and earned a PhD from Queen Mary University of London.<\/em><\/p>\n

Giovanna d\u2019Adda is Associate Professor at the Department of Economics, Management, and Quantitative Methods of the University of Milan, and Head of the Behavioral Science Unit at the European Institute on Economics and the Environment (EIEE). She works on behavioral and environmental economics.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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