Workplace absenteeism cost the Spanish economy €59,109 million in 2025, marking an 11.7% increase compared to the previous year, according to estimates from The Adecco Group Institute. This economic impact equals approximately 3.7% of Spain’s gross domestic product, prompting businesses to reorganize shifts and adapt staffing levels as absence rates continue to pressure overall productivity.
The rising cost of lost work hours has triggered concrete changes in collective bargaining agreements, particularly within the industrial metal sector. Facing a sharp surge in missed days, employers and unions are increasingly moving away from guaranteed full wage coverage during common illness leaves, establishing time caps and reducing supplementary benefits for repeated absences.
This figure represents a two-tenth increase over the same period in the prior year. In absolute terms, an average of 1,637,174 people failed to report to work each day during that timeframe, with 1,274,528 of those absences stemming from temporary disability leave.
Medical leaves accounted for 5.6% of all contracted hours, showing that sickness absences drove the overall trend. A separate quarterly analysis by Adecco recorded the total absenteeism rate at 7.76% for the same second quarter, attributing 6.04% to temporary disability. Industry sectors experienced particularly heavy losses, with Randstad calculating an industrial absenteeism rate of 7.7% and Adecco placing it at 8.32%.
Industrial Sector Tightens Sickness Leave Policies
The metal industries have emerged as focal points for addressing the absenteeism surge. Figures compiled by Confemetal indicate that missed workdays across the metal sector have jumped by 95% since 2021, with more than 140,000 workers absent daily out of a total workforce exceeding 2.7 million employees and self-employed professionals.
To curb these mounting costs, collective agreements across various regions are altering how companies supplement public sick pay. In the Huelva metal industry, agreements now cap the duration of full wage maintenance during common illness leaves at between 100 and 200 days. Meanwhile, retail metal employers in Burgos apply a tiered system where full wage coverage for a first medical leave lasts up to 20 days, drops to 10 days for a second absence, and disappears entirely by the third.
In addition to restricting leave supplements, employers are expanding attendance incentives. The metal commerce agreement in Madrid ties a productivity improvement bonus—equivalent to 1.5% of the worker’s salary—to a strict threshold of no more than eight hours of absence per month. These adjustments do not impose blanket wage reductions across all staff on leave, as terms vary by regional agreement and preserve explicit protections for workplace accidents, professional illnesses, and specific protected health situations.
Metal Sector Faces Recruitment Hurdles and Rising Wages
The financial strain of missed workdays arrives alongside structural recruitment hurdles. Confemetal estimates that the metal sector must recruit approximately 350,000 professionals in the coming years, even as roughly 240,000 workers approach retirement age. Openings in specialized fields such as defense, energy transition, climate control systems, and energy efficiency continue to exacerbate the difficulty of filling vacancies.
Concurrently, baseline compensation continues to rise across the sector. The 15 metal industry collective agreements signed in 2026 secure an average wage increase of 4.34% for 222,000 workers. Employer organizations emphasize that ongoing collective bargaining remains the primary mechanism for reconciling corporate productivity needs with workers’ financial security during medical leave.
