Abstract

The Covid-19 pandemic emergency put pressure on the organization of the production and employment system in Italy and required strategies to ensure the safety of workers and consumers from the risks of contagion. Organizational models that exploit the possibility offered by technology to work remotely were used. The aim of the paper is to compare the Italian labour market before the pandemic, when work from home concerns only a negligible percentage of employment, with a hypothetical scenario where all the feasible remotely jobs could be performed from home. The paper analyzes the consistency and the characteristics of workers who worked remotely before the pandemic using the results of the ad hoc module of the Italian Labour force survey. A classification of occupations is proposed on the basis of their potential remote feasibility and an estimate of their extent in the Italian labor market is provided. Finally, the paper focuses on the actual remote working experience during the Covid-19 emergency.