In my 11 years at my transportation job, I've known a number of folks that have either had massive strokes, heart attacks, or have been injured to the point of permanent disability. The latter is what I worry about the most. Repetitive injury is a phrase that can't possibly exist to our "safety" management, though I also know a similar number of people that have been put on light duty, temporary disability, or even extensive surgeries related to doing the same thing day in and day out. All that doesn't even begin to touch upon the various drug and alcohol abuse that is prevalent in my particular line of work, between hourly and management alike. These are possibly relevant to the aforementioned strokes or heart attacks. Layoffs are rare for those I directly work with, the insurance is incredible, it's a lot of exercise, and pay is not an issue with enough seniority, so I think it boils down to poor management and demand for more production with fewer people in order to increase profits and appease shareholders. Hard work is rewarded with even more work. But as keifermiller said, employer negligence is definitely an issue. There are plenty of ways I can be easily hurt to the point of permanent disability or even death, and they can certainly be mitigated, but that would hurt production and therefore profit.
I'm mostly worried about my job directly killing me. https://aflcio.org/reports/death-job-toll-neglect-2018 "report" is generous for what that is, tho.
It may be the mescaline kicking in, but by my logic as an unemployed American this makes me immortal. Seriously, at least two works I've read as I recover from addiction, depression and generally fucking up my life say rewarding work is incredibly important. I know I said the other day to be pragmatic and not follow your heart, but that is not at odds with finding a career that is both somehow rewarding and can support you
I don't think my job is killing me. What I can't tell is if I'm an outlier (i.e. articles like this one are true) or if articles like this are fear mongering. I don't fear losing my job, but should I fear that if I door ifi elect to change I'll face all these problems? Also, it seems the title could be "your job and family are killing you."
Everything is fucking killing us. Plastic. Microwave radiation. Traffic. Red meat. White meat. Fish. Tainted produce. I think I'm unusually unafraid of death. The circumstances of mine, its cause and its inevitability. Fear mongering death is a great way to grab attention but that doesn't mean every attempt to do it is sensationalism. It just means if you read it you gotta be critical and ask if the information is at all useful
We work in different fields, but from where I stand it doesn't feel like employers are going out of their way to foster a work/life balance or healthy, stable work environments. Speaking of work/life balance, this article (also from The Week) talks about how flexible work hours might benefit employers and hurt employees.
I've never asked for much from my employer for work/life balance other than not working a ton outside of normal hours (e.g. I haven't had children or a major family illness). It seems like the company has a pretty decent work/life balance, but I also think a lot of that boils down to company culture and the people in management that foster it. I think it's really fragile. There's nothing set in stone in the company that people will be understanding.