Are the Individual Productivity Level and the Work-Related Health or Safety Risk Lower Among Older Employees than Among Younger Employees?

Abstract Previous studies show that individual productivity potential (IPP) scores differ across age groups, and that stronger perceived workplace health and safety climates and occupational health and safety (OHS) interventions are associated with improved workplace productivity. This raises the question of whether workplace productivity and work-related health or safety (HS) risk are related to age, and whether improved workplace productivity is associated with increased HS risk. Our research questions are: (i) whether older employees have a lower individual productivity level and lower work-related HS risk than younger employees, and (ii) whether employees’ work-related HS risk is related to their individual productivity level. HS risk reflects whether an employee thinks his or her HS is at risk because of the person’s work, and individual productivity level is measured by how often an employee works at very high speed. We use data on employees from the European Working Conditions Telephone Survey (EWCTS) for 2021. Based on the generalized structural equation model, we find that older employees have a lower individual productivity level, and the youngest employees a higher level, than the middle-aged employees. Younger employees also have a lower probability of reporting a work-related HS risk than the middle-aged employees, while there are no significant differences in this probability between older employees and the middle-aged employees. Furthermore, the probability of reporting a work-related HS risk is positively related to the level of individual productivity.