babble home
rabble.ca - news for the rest of us
today's active topics


Post New Topic  Post A Reply
FAQ | Forum Home
  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» babble   » walking the talk   » labour and consumption   » Downsizing means that work is bad for your health

Email this thread to someone!    
Author Topic: Downsizing means that work is bad for your health
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 11 November 2004 03:02 PM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
What else is new, eh? In Tuesday's paper, the Saskatoon StarPhoenix had an article noting that:
quote:
The downsizing that swept the country's workplaces during the 1980's and 1990's backfired, with so much work piled on employees that billions of dollars have been unnecessarily added to Canada's annual health-care costs, says a landmark study.

The federally funded study...is the first to link the mounting workloads of Canadians and soaring health-care costs. It concludes stress and illness caused by work overload is adding an extra $6 billion a year in health-care costs while the strain of elder care adds another $5 billion a year.

But Linda Duxbury, one of the report's co-authors, insists those extra costs are the "tip of the iceberg" because the study only examined the impact on family doctors, emergency rooms and in-hospital stays.


So capitalism is bad for your health. What a suprise. I won't be getting rid of my copy of Das Capital just yet. But this report also gives a whole new twist to the right-wing attack on health-care funding, doesn't it?

Here's some more....

quote:
"It's time we stopped pretending that we're going to fix health care by throwing more money at system fixes and start looking at what makes people sick. And what makes people sick is workload and the strain of elder care," said Duxbury. "...policy makers should recognize we have a finite resource in people and start crying for something to be done about the work environment."

I'm definitely keeping that copy of Capital . Ain't capitalism grand?

Here is the link to the report:

Working Conditions as a Determinant of Health


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
BLAKE 3:16
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2978

posted 11 November 2004 03:54 PM      Profile for BLAKE 3:16     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
It's pretty interesting, isn't it? The popular version I read about this report was that poor working conditions ending up costing capitalists and the state toons of moolah.

I don't know if yu ever saw them, but there was an "Adorno Was Right" Tshirt sround a few years ago. I used to apporach people wering it and ask "Was he?" Got odd looks. MARX WAS RIGHT -- not a bout everything but about a lot of the basics, especially Capital.

Edited to add: I was talking to some janitors in a school last night. They are supposedly on Work-To-Rule. I asked them if they were doing it, and they said they couldn't get their work done with any breaks, including the the legal specified ones. Three guys doing the job of six. Keerazy, and not in the good way.

[ 11 November 2004: Message edited by: BLAKE 3:16 ]


From: Babylon, Ontario | Registered: Aug 2002  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 11 November 2004 04:09 PM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Other than belonging to, and being active in, a union ... about the best thing that one can do is to find a way to recognize and deal with the stress in one's (working) life. But that isn't much consolation for those who are taking care of elders, for example, and know exactly what the problem is but can't do much about it.

Me? Single, BWAGA-member, no pets and hardly anything of value worth stealing. Hopefully, I will get laid off soon....


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
paxamillion
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 2836

posted 11 November 2004 04:11 PM      Profile for paxamillion   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Laid off or just......?
From: the process of recovery | Registered: Jul 2002  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 11 November 2004 04:16 PM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
That's a great stress reliever. I think.

But it has nothing to do with the downsizing theme of this thread.

(snicker-snicker.)

[ 11 November 2004: Message edited by: N.Beltov ]


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
Doug
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 44

posted 11 November 2004 05:14 PM      Profile for Doug   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
They just downsize in nicer ways when you're unionized but the results are the same for those of us left behind. Where I am, 11% of the company has been retired off or accepted a voluntary departure package and are leaving by the end of the year. There's an unfortunate disjoint between the departure of the people that are leaving and the arrival of the new processes and technology that are supposed to make us more productive, eliminating the need for those people. In the meantime, we could be in trouble.
From: Toronto, Canada | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
Fidel
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 5594

posted 11 November 2004 05:18 PM      Profile for Fidel     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Yes, this is how capitalists get rich: by stealing unpaid overtime hours from what's left of the working class while reducing wages and benefits. Threatening to offshore is a useful tactic in plying the feds for more corporate welfare handouts, too.
From: Viva La Revolución | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged
Cougyr
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 3336

posted 11 November 2004 07:49 PM      Profile for Cougyr     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I was downsized from a high tech company. They paid a lot of money to buy out all of us over 50, and they gave us all really good retirement packages. None of us could really figure out why. The result was that the company stock went from $65 to $5 (approx). Smart move: get rid of all your experienced people, terrorize your remaining people, piss off your customers and wonder what happened.
From: over the mountain | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
Fidel
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 5594

posted 11 November 2004 10:02 PM      Profile for Fidel     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Me too, although my separation pay wasn't enough to live on for the rest my life. I'm in my late 30's, and getting the heave-ho was a bit of blow to my ego at the time. Security told me to clean out my desk and be out of the building by five o'clock. I remember wondering what in hell was going on. After speaking with former supervisors and fellow pink slippers, I realized it was nothing personal. The telco switch maker made a habit of doing clean sweeps of entire departments regardless of talent or seniority. I went from proud to being depressed overnight. Oh well.

I've found that the bigger the company is, the more narrowly focused your job description is. Smaller companies let you shove a broom up your derriere and do a lot more... or else.


From: Viva La Revolución | Registered: Apr 2004  |  IP: Logged
Tommy_Paine
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 214

posted 12 November 2004 09:49 AM      Profile for Tommy_Paine     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
One of the long term effects of downsizing is the deterioration of the work ethic. With people taking over bits and pieces of other people's jobs, which they can't do all elements of properly, doing a job half assed becomes acceptable.
From: The Alley, Behind Montgomery's Tavern | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
Cougyr
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 3336

posted 12 November 2004 12:29 PM      Profile for Cougyr     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Tommy_Paine:
One of the long term effects of downsizing is the deterioration of the work ethic. With people taking over bits and pieces of other people's jobs, which they can't do all elements of properly, doing a job half assed becomes acceptable.

You're right. Think about this: A company has high priced executives earning mega dollars and driving company cars and running big expense accounts. They lay off the account clerks who processed all those expense accounts and now the high priced execs are themselves doing the accounting. So, the cost of processing expense accounts has gone from about $15/hour to executive wage level, and the execs are processing accounts instead of running the company. Does that make sense to you? It ouldn't surprise me if the execs wound up sweeping the floor.


From: over the mountain | Registered: Nov 2002  |  IP: Logged
miles
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 7209

posted 12 November 2004 12:32 PM      Profile for miles     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
if you look at most of the major hospitals in the greater toronto area they have "downsized" which is another word for privatiszing some services. at the same time the list of executives that earn over 100,000 keeps growing and growing and growing.

when a company downsizes it is using a buzz word for firing those that it can get away with kicking out. the lowest on the totem pole or the lower middle end of the pole.

but the incompetants whose decisions caused this keep going like the energizer battery.


From: vaughan | Registered: Oct 2004  |  IP: Logged
N.Beltov
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 4140

posted 26 November 2004 09:45 PM      Profile for N.Beltov   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
The change from (some version of) socialism to gangster capitalism in the former Socialist Countries has some notable results. Here's one:

quote:
In eastern and central European countries where poorly regulated capitalism replaced communism almost overnight, stress and mental illness took a serious toll in men. Their life expectancy decreased by as much as 13 years while the life expectancy of women did not change. Similarly, male suicide rates soared during the "Great Depression" of the 1930's, when vast numbers of American men were unemployed.

The "scare quotes" around "Great Depression" are mine...the same term was used to describe the previous capitalist economic collapse in the 1890's so the term was used to describe only the most recent atrocities....Anyway, this is a sidebar. My point is that the source of this quote is that radical "left-wing" rag.......wait for it......The Mayo Clinic Newsletter. An obvious left-wing front. NOT!

Capitalism is bad for your health, men. It's fucking time we started naming the system that sucks.

naming the system that sucks
o yes
naming the system that sucks
the system
the system
the system that sucks
naming the system that sucks...

Here is the link for the doubting Thomases...

Male depression: Seldom recognized, often lethal .


From: Vancouver Island | Registered: May 2003  |  IP: Logged
dillinger
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 7346

posted 29 November 2004 12:14 PM      Profile for dillinger   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
the amazing thing is how utterly unnecessary all this is. in a democratically planned economy instead of downsizing we could just give people more time off. imagine that: a new technological advance or superior method of organizing production wouldn't be something to fear, but look forward to. jobs getting replaced by machines? right on! less work and more time to read books, write articles, play sports, make art, just goof off!

it's time to fire the boss. we can't afford him anymore.


From: Toronto | Registered: Nov 2004  |  IP: Logged

All times are Pacific Time  

Post New Topic  Post A Reply Close Topic    Move Topic    Delete Topic next oldest topic   next newest topic
Hop To:

Contact Us | rabble.ca | Policy Statement

Copyright 2001-2008 rabble.ca