🇫🇮 Finland

Benefits of work-ability management in SMEs. Tailored Work (ESF+) project SROI evaluation

Original title: Työkykyjohtamisen hyödyt PK-yrityksissä. Räätälöity työ (ESR+) -hankkeen SROI-arviointi

Forecast SROI by the Rehabilitation Foundation (Kuntoutussäätiö), commissioned by the ESF+-funded Räätälöity työ project at South-Eastern Finland University of Applied Sciences (2025). Using Markov modelling of reduced sickness absence in SMEs, it estimates that investing in work-ability management could save about 7 times the time cost over five years. Only the companies were included as stakeholders.

Labour Supply Responses to Reducing the Risk of Losing Disability Insurance Benefits

Using Finnish administrative data, the paper finds that automatic reinstatement, a programme that mitigates partial disability insurance recipients' risk of losing eligibility during a trial period of substantially increased work, increases annual earnings modestly, with a larger effect for those with mental disorders. (FIT Working Paper 20, Paukkeri & Ravaska, 2024)

Economic losses from sickness absence in Finland

Original title: Sairauspoissaolojen taloudelliset menetykset Suomessa

Article by Antti J. Tanskanen, Antti Ripatti and Auli Rytivaara in the Finnish medical journal Duodecim (2026) estimating lost labour input from ill-health. Using the friction-cost method, all sickness absence cost €4.8 billion in 2023; transitions from long sickness absence to disability pension cost €5.2 billion a year in lost labour input. About 25 million working days are lost to sickness absence a year, each costing €257–420.

Sickness absences due to mental health reasons cost over one billion euros annually in lost labour input

Original title: Sairauspoissaolot mielenterveyssyistä maksavat menetettynä työpanoksena yli miljardi euroa vuodessa

Kela, Finland's social insurance institution, estimates (with the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health) that long sickness absences due to mental disorders cost an estimated 5.8 million working days, or 26,000 person-years, in 2023. Valuing lost work at wage costs times 1.3, the lost labour input was worth at least €1 billion; indirect costs such as substitutes and health services are not included.

The cost of disability pensions

Original title: Työkyvyttömyyseläkkeiden kustannus

Peer-reviewed article by Sampo Lappo and Ismo Risku of the Finnish Centre for Pensions (Kansantaloudellinen aikakauskirja, 2023), using individual-level data. In 2021, people on earnings-related disability pensions lost about EUR 2.5 billion in earnings, and the value of their lost work input was at least EUR 3.0 billion. 85 per cent of the cost fell on those on full disability pensions.