Did COVID-19 Fundamentally Reshape Telecommuting in California?

Research Lead: Jean-Daniel Saphores (lead) and Md. Rabiul Islam

UC Campus(es): UC Irvine

Problem Statement: Driven by public health concerns and enabled by advances in communication technologies, the Covid-19 pandemic led to an unprecedented shift to telework (telecommuting), lifting the reluctance of many employers to give up direct supervisory control. When stay-at-home restrictions were in place, this contributed to drastic reductions in vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and energy use from household travel and a stark improvement in air quality in some previously heavily polluted areas of California. As the pandemic came to a close with the increasing rate of vaccinations, road congestion began to increase steadily. This raised questions like: what was the impact on commuting of the stay-at-home orders for Californians, to what extent is the shift to telework permanent, and what are the implications for VMT and the emissions of various criteria pollutants and greenhouse gases?

Project Description: To investigate the impact of the pandemic on telecommuting, this project analyzed a dataset collected at the end of May 2021 by Ipsos via a random survey of Californians in KnowledgePanel©, the largest and oldest probability-based panel in the United States. The research team’s structural equation models account for car ownership and housing costs to explain telecommuting frequency before, during, and possibly after the pandemic. This project found that an additional 4.2% of California workers expect to engage in some level of telecommuting post-pandemic, which is substantial but possibly less than suggested in other studies. Some likely durable gains can be expected for Californians who work in management, business / finance / administration, and engineering / architecture / law / social sciences. Workers with more education started telecommuting more during the pandemic, a trend expected to continue post-pandemic. Full time work status has a negative impact on telecommuting frequency, and so does household size during and after the pandemic.

Status: Completed

Budget: $76,966