Absenteeism is completely

Absenteeism is completely involuntary absenteeism or whole without medical justification is entirely voluntary, so that the classification as clearly marked on the theory, in practice includes a fairly significant overlap both categories.

Notably, as defined by ILO, Excluding holiday periods as absenteeism (because there are employees who "thought they were going to attend," but also strikes, normal pregnancy and prison. From our point of view, the three situations should be included in the measurement of absenteeism. Though the strike is a recognized right of workers in the legislation of a number of countries, the fact is that means no work for workers who thought they were going to go (or at least there were them when the activity is planned in the short or medium term) therefore implies economic loss to the organization. Indeed the strength of this measure lies in this fact. Regarding pregnancy, which would surely reflect ILO that pregnancy is not a disease. However, it implies a prolonged absence of the employee (in the legislation of our country covers a minimum of 90 days which can be extended at the request of the Social Security Bank in a variable period of weeks with special hours for breastfeeding). This requires reprogramming of tasks or a temporary replacement worker.

We believe that this issue is highly relevant, as it is estimated that the damage to the economy from this cause are certainly substantial. We say probably because you did not know recent measurements and overall absenteeism, conducted nationwide.

One study of Foundation European for Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, published in 1997, showing that in many countries Union European Only sickness absence can be a 2 to 3% of GDP.

Keep in mind that if, in our country, the figure was similar to that, that would be to export leather, rice and textiles.

In 2005 Uruguay's GDP was 18,600 billion and employed persons had 1:114.500 (source: National Statistics Institute). It follows that each person was $ 16,689 per year, 46.36 per day worked. The 2% of GDP amounts to $ 372 million. Considering that each worker produces 46.36 per day, this $ 372 million amount to 8:024.159. If we get the ratio between this figure and the number of workers, which throws us, with each worker had absented seven days in the year of its work, the levels of Uruguay would be located in the ranges outlined in the previous paragraph.

Moreover, the Social Security Bank paid in the year 2004, an amount of dollars in 155:665.662 insurance (approximately equivalent to almost 1% of GDP in that year) [2] and the Bank State Insurance paid approximately $ 18.5 million in revenue and $ 5.5 million for temporary compensation. The direct costs of medical claims and other expenses are estimated at $ 20 million per year [3] .

We think that both are a vivid expression of the magnitude of the problem.

Health conditions of the labor force in each country have a direct and immediate economic impact on the national and global economy. Total economic losses caused by diseases and injuries are substantial. These losses represent a heavy burden for economic development.(Hamoui and collaborators in January , citing International Labour Organization, 1999)

Given the absence of official statistics and the inability to develop them within the scope of this thesis, we decided to focus the study on a more qualitative. We carry out an extensive literature review and interviewed four experts, seeking to collect the national experience in the field and to conclude about which could be the appropriate measures to resolve the economic impact of this problem, looking further promote future studies, performed systematically, allow permanent monitoring of the magnitude.

The author concludes by making the following recommendations:

1. Continued absenteeism studies the effects of the evolution of such absenteeism and thus to estimate the real importance of the indicators calculated.

2. Planning and conducting studies to deepen as quantitative-qualitative about the characteristics and opinions of workers and of the conditions and working environment, aimed at developing strategies to improve them.

3. Planning for specific health programs aimed at the prevention of respiratory diseases and musculoskeletal mainly.

4. Coordination with other public and private institutions for similar studies and the organization of an information center on this subject which would be of great interest to institutions, researchers, workers, employers and / or those related to health and work.

For its part, Ms.Bayce [6] emphasizes the costs of absenteeism and suggests that they are composed of direct costs arising for the maintenance of social security contributions (plus the additional benefits that the company can pay the worker sick) and indirect costs arising from payments to the worker also must make the worker activity even in the absence of being in a situation of temporary incapacity. In the institution studied by Ms. Bayce and always citing his thesis, these payments are for old home constituted, premium power, extended hours, tenure, compensation insurance coverage and paid vacation.

The author also mentions that there is a third type of cost, which called hidden costs and derive, in their opinion, the time lost by the worker himself absent, the time necessary to provide that the absent worker's task is performed by another, the decline in performance of the team and the loss of production and market for late dearer service or product as well as the administrative costs of recruitment and training of substitute staff, increased overtime and others.

The population studied by Ms. Bayce was 65 persons, who missed a total of 1647 days, which is an average of more than 25 days per person in 2000 (in which the study was conducted).

It is necessary to emphasize some points:

• Both studies were conducted in public sector enterprises

• Both studies were conducted in institutions providing health services

• Both works were made several years ago

This means that, on the one hand, both studies have only internal validity and, moreover, that the absence of a follow-up, the results may not be representative of the current reality.

Absenteeism as a dependent variable

In the model of Robbins, Absenteeism is one of the dependent variables, along with productivity, turnover, and satisfaction citizenship.

According to Robbins, these dependent variables or output, resulting from the interaction of different factors acting on the individual level, at the level of the group to which the individual belongs and at the system level of the organization.

These variables, separate the author calls are listed below:

• Plan the individual

or Capacity

or individual learning

or Motivation

or values and attitudes

or Perception

or personality and emotions

or biographical characteristics

or individual decision making

• Group Plano

or Communication

or Conflict

or Power and Politics

or group structure

or the Team

or Leadership and trust

• Plano organizational system

or Organizational culture

or structure and organization design

or design and technology work

or policies and practices of human resources

These variables also are not isolated but interact with each other to varying degrees, within their level but also through the various levels.

An interesting feature is that the model can be used both in the descriptive sense and in the explanatory sense, which makes it ausentimo be used as an indicator of some of the other variables.

Measuring absenteeism

Investigate the phenomenon of absenteeism, particularly trying to compare studies from different backgrounds, offering the difficulty that there is no unanimous agreement on how to calculate the various indicators that measure the magnitude of the phenomenon.[8]

The recommendations ILO cited by Hamoui and colleagues 1 suggest the use of the following indicators:

Overall rate of absenteeism: represents the ratio in percentage between the working days lost due to absenteeism and scheduled work days.

Severity: The relationship between the working days lost to absenteeism and the number of workers at risk.

Frequency rate: The ratio between the number of episodes of absenteeism and the number of workers at risk

Index average length of the low: The relationship between total days lost and the number of episodes of absenteeism.

Study of the causes of absenteeism

As mentioned above, the traditional division between voluntary and involuntary absenteeism hides an inescapable reality, which is that there is a large overlap between the two. To put it in colloquial language, not all patients are away at work, and all those who are absent for reasons other than illness they do it one hundred percent voluntary, but respond to factors beyond their control that drive them to take the decision to miss.

Samaniego 8 states that there are " two variables that determine the employee's attendance: motivation of assistance and support capacity or ability " . It is the interaction of these two variables, we add, whence comes the decision to go to work or leave.

The difficulty in analyzing and understanding the phenomenon of absenteeism, is that, according to the same author, "the truant, usually disguises the real reasons for his absence under different garments, to make it socially acceptable."

The origin of absenteeism is certainly multifactorial

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