Health, work and working conditions: a review of the European economic literature

Abstract

Economists have traditionally been very cautious when studying the interaction between employment and health because of the two-way causal relationship between these two variables: health status influences the probability of being employed and, at the same time, working affects the health status. Because these two variables are determined simultaneously, researchers control endogeneity skews (e.g., reverse causality, omitted variables) when conducting empirical analysis. With these caveats in mind, the literature finds that a favourable work environment and high job security lead to better health conditions. Being employed with appropriate working conditions plays a protective role on physical health and psychiatric disorders. By contrast, non-employment and retirement are generally worse for mental health than employment, and overemployment has a negative effect on health. These findings stress the importance of employment and of adequate working conditions for the health of workers. In this context, it is a concern that a significant proportion of European workers (29 %) would like to work fewer hours because unwanted long hours are likely to signal a poor level of job satisfaction and inadequate working conditions, with detrimental effects on health. Thus, in Europe, labour-market policy has increasingly paid attention to job sustainability and job satisfaction. The literature clearly invites employers to take better account of the worker preferences when setting the number of hours worked. Overall, a specific "flexicurity" (combination of high employment protection, job satisfaction and active labour-market policies) is likely to have a positive effect on health.

Is temporary employment damaging to health? A longitudinal study on Italian workers

“…Literature suggests that the association between work and health may be bidirectional (Barnay, 2014;Benavides et al, 2000): precarious employment could worsen health status (causation hypothesis) as above discussed, and vice-versa, a precarious health status may prevent access to better employment conditions (selection hypothesis), including more stable jobs. Certain individuals might have characteristics that result in poor health conditions and temporary commitment in the labor market.…”

Untitled

“…Others (Kalwij and Vermeulen, 2008), however, argue that objective health indicators should be used in tandem with SRH because different health indicators may reflect different dimensions of health. A systematic review of literature on health measurements and biases is provided extensively in Barnay (2016).…”

Sharing the Fruits of Growth with all Mexicans

“…For instance, people that report working long hours are more likely to follow unhealthy lifestyles, such as smoking, coffee intake and alcohol consumption, lack of exercise and poor diet Burke and Cooper (2008). Finally, working long hours can have a negative effect on mental health, life satisfaction and happiness (Barnay, 2014).…”