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Comprehensive prevention policies at the workplace may help to reduce social inequalities in mental health in the working population.

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Industrial relations are widely regulated by law in France, while the British system is essentially voluntaristic. More broadly, the structures, strategies and ideologies of social actors in the two countries differ profoundly. Comparative statistical analysis, based on two similar workplace industrial relations surveys (WIRS 90 and REPONSE 92), sheds some light on the internal logic of each system. Our results show that while British unions, in the establishments where they still exist, certainly have more members and more formal involvement in management decisions, their French counterparts are present in a larger proportion of establishments, and have a greater ability to mobilize workers for conflict when they find it necessary.

Objectives: The objectives were to examine the prospective associations between psychosocial work factors of the job strain model and all-cause mortality in a national representative cohort of French employees using various measures of time-varying exposure. Methods:The study was based on a sample of 798,547 men and 697,785 women for which data on job history from 1976 to 2002 were linked to mortality data from the national death registry. Psychosocial work factors from the validated job strain model questionnaire were imputed using a job-exposure matrix. Three time-varying measures of exposure were explored: current, cumulative, and recency-weighted cumulative exposure. Cox proportional hazards models were performed to study the associations between psychosocial work factors and mortality.Results: Within the 1976-2002 period, 88,521 deaths occurred among men and 28,921 among women. Low decision latitude, low social support, job strain, isostrain, high strain, and passive job were found to be risk factors for mortality. The model using current exposure was the best relative quality model. The associations of current exposure to job strain and mortality were found to be HR=1.30 (95% CI: 1.24-1.36) among men and HR=1.15 (95% CI:1.06-1.25) among women. The population fractions of mortality attributable to job strain were 5.64% (95% CI: 4.56%-6.71%) among men and 4.13% (95% CI: 1.69%-6.71%) among women. Conclusions:This study supports the role of the psychosocial work factors of the job strain model on all-cause mortality. Preventive intervention to improve the psychosocial work environment may help to prevent mortality in working populations.