How green is my firm? Workers' attitudes and behaviors towards job in environmentally-related firms

•We study if environmental-related standards impact employees' attitudes or effort.•“Green employees” feel more useful and equitably recognized at work.•“Green employees” are more likely to work uncompensated overtime hours.•Environmental-related standards have no direct influence on job involvement.•Environmental-related standards indirectly impact job involvement.

The implementation of environmental standards can be facilitated by motivating workers with pro-social preferences. Therefore, we study if employees working for firms achieving registration for environmental-related standards are more likely to display positive attitudes towards their job, to be actively involved in their jobs and to donate effort. Using a French matched employer-employee database, we find that these “green employees” report a significantly higher perception of usefulness and equitable recognition at work. Besides, they are more likely to work uncompensated overtime hours. Finally, if the adoption of environmental standards is shown to have no direct influence on job involvement, we expose how it indirectly impacts job involvement through the mediation of employees' reported perception of usefulness and equitable recognition at work.