Yahoo! News - Survey: Swedes Skip Work Due to Fatigue

Yahoo! News - Survey: Swedes Skip Work Due to Fatigue

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Survey: Swedes Skip Work Due to Fatigue

Fri Sep 17, 2:08 PM ET


By MATTIAS KAREN, Associated Press Writer

STOCKHOLM, Sweden - In a country already plagued by skyrocketing sick leave costs, a new survey found that 40 percent of the population thinks it's acceptable to skip work because they feel tired or have trouble getting along with their colleagues.

The survey, presented Friday by the National Social Insurance Board, showed that Swedes manifestly take advantage of the country's liberal sick leave system, officials said.

Sixty-five percent of the 1,002 people interviewed also said that a stressful work situation is also a valid reason for calling in sick.

The survey shows "a deep lack of knowledge about what the health insurance is meant to cover," board director Anna Hedborg said of Sweden's 9 million residents.

Alf Eckerhall, a social insurance expert with the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, went a step further: many Swedes are deliberately abusing the system.

"The insurance laws clearly state that inability to work because of illness" is the only valid reason to stay home, Eckerhall said. "The key word is 'inability to work' — not 'illness.'"

The survey, conducted June 17-24, did not have a margin of error.

Sweden's extensive cradle-to-grave welfare system includes generous social insurance programs covering sick leave, parental leave and unemployment benefits.

But paying for workers on long-term sick leave and disability has become one of the government's biggest expenditures.

Sick leave compensation tripled from 15 billion kronor ($2 billion) in 1997 to 45 billion kronor ($6 billion) in 2002.

In Sweden, the employer pays for the first three weeks' sick leave and workers can call in sick for seven days before needing a doctor's certificate or medical proof.

People who call in sick do not receive any compensation for the first day they are absent.

But Eckerhall said many are abusing the current system by leaving work and calling in sick shortly before their work day is over. That then counts as one sick day, which lets them start receiving sick pay the next day.

"That means your day without compensation was 15 minutes long," Eckerhall said. "Medically speaking, that sounds pretty odd."

Hedborg said the board will launch a massive nationwide campaign to inform people that only illness is a valid reason to stay home from work, she said.

"To many, this message may seem hard and even insensitive," she wrote. "The truth is that if we don't defend our common insurance today, we won't be able to afford keeping it."