Urban commuting time and sick-leave medical license use: An empirical study of Santiago, Chile

We use a large dataset from the Chilean unemployment insurance program covering 20% of all formal sector workers to study the impact of commuting time on the likelihood of sick-leave in Santiago, Chile. Our empirical results indicate that longer commuting times are associated with an increase in the probability of sick-leave work absence. A 20% decrease in commuting times would generate close to 36 million dollars per year in productivity benefits. Our results also suggest that commuting travel time improvements targeted to women, lower paid workers and relatively older workers would provide the highest benefits in terms of lowering sick-leave behavior. We also find evidence that mobility infrastructure investments, such as metro and commuter rail expansions, reduce the probability of sick-leave. The results of this paper have implications for measuring the social costs of congestion and for the estimation of the wider economic benefits of transport projects.