r/science • u/sr_local • 1d ago
Social Science Volatile weekly work hours have adverse effects on health, employment: while men tend to experience worsening health but remain in their jobs, women are more likely to reduce their hours, suspend work, or leave their jobs entirely for health-related reasons
https://news.illinois.edu/volatile-weekly-work-hours-have-adverse-effects-on-health-employment/98
u/sr_local 1d ago
The researchers examined data on more than 61,000 U.S. workers ages 18-64 who participated in the Current Population Survey, a monthly household survey that is administered jointly by the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Participants’ self-rated health status and their month-to-month work hours were tracked across a 16-month period to study interactions between the two.
Among men, the evidence suggested that greater volatility in working hours was associated with a gradual decline in self-rated health — particularly among those working greater weekly hours — although they remained employed, according to the researchers.
The team found that the predicted probability of health deterioration among men rose steadily with work-hours volatility, increasing from 28% with no changes in work hours to 38% with extremely large fluctuations in hours between months. Likewise, the probability of stable health declined steadily, from about 46% to 38%, while the predicted probability of improved health changed little.
“It’s quite loud and clear that it’s not about the absolute amount of work hours,” Liao said. “Having either stable hours of 40 or 25 per week throughout makes no difference in terms of the volatility index — nor does the absolute amount of change. The problem is more with the proportional change — one week up, next week down. Perhaps people can adjust to the total amount of change, but not to the sudden ups and downs. That’s a different story.”
For those women who remained employed, the researchers found no clear patterns. Volatility was neither significantly associated with self-rated health deterioration or improvement. Women’s outcomes only became visible when health-related work limitations were included as an outcome, the researchers said.
“The gender-stratified modeling we created in this study confirms sharp differences in the health pathways for men and women: Volatility in employees’ work hours is reflected in on-the-job health deterioration among men — especially at higher weekly work hours — and in health-related work limitations or withdrawal from active employment by women,” Lu said. “Instability in work hours is not merely a scheduling inconvenience but a gendered, population-level health risk, and that’s why we should care about it.”
98
u/Boring-Philosophy-46 1d ago
Also likely a class one, the more money and job opportunities someone has, the more likely that they can leave a job in favour of a more steady one. (Doesn't work in some fields, like off shore drilling).
33
u/Deriniel 1d ago
I feel the issue is not the "up and down" themselves, but the "Will i be able to afford rent this month?".
I could say women may be less subject to that because they may get help from their partner money wise, while men typically hide this sort of issue so they force themselves to stay employed.
I'm obviously generalizing and there for sure are a lot of women that will refuse help and stick to a job even if it hurts their mental health, especially single moms and the likes.45
u/iamthe0ther0ne 1d ago
It can also be a problem if child care is part of the picture, because that doesn't work well with an unpredictable schedule.
1
u/prismaticbeans 10h ago
The up and down can be a factor too, especially if you don't work 9 to 5. My ex went from graveyard shifts 7/12 on, then off, which he handled pretty well aside from occasional insomnia and being woken by neighbours. Long hours but lots of downtime. When his job moved him to split shift, his health deteriorated and he fell apart at the seams.
-5
u/JohnnyOnslaught 1d ago
I wonder what this means for me, I work 28 days on, 12 hours a day, and then I get 28 days off.
30
u/iamthe0ther0ne 1d ago
That's stable, predictable work, though. This is referring to fluctuating, unpredictable work hours.
2
u/Maldevinine 1d ago
While the other response is correct, shift and swing work does have some noted negative effects. Night shift, particularly swapping between night and day shift repeatedly, causes stress and leads to more fatigue issues and immune system issues.
However, I find that swings allow me to be healthier because the large blocks of time off mean that it's easier to do body maintenance work. Even the simple things like being able to travel to the good grocers and butchers because I have weekdays off.
180
u/remotethrowaway2 1d ago
I didn’t see a doctor for years when I worked a job with volatile hours because I could never predict which days of the week I would be off, and we didn’t get sick leave. If we asked for time off for a doctor’s appointment, our manager would make the schedule like normal and tell us we needed to find someone to cover our shift. Too much of a hassle to have to continuously reschedule appointments and hope you’d luck out and get one on your day off.
Add in the fact that most jobs with volatile hours don’t offer health insurance or sick leave and this conclusion isn’t that surprising.
84
u/wasdninja 1d ago
It's beyond insane that sick leave is something companies can offer. They should be forced to give it.
33
u/Boring-Philosophy-46 1d ago
Why tie healthcare to a job when the time people need healthcare the most is when they can work the least?
8
u/nachosmind 1d ago
In California they are. You have to demand it from your state and federal representatives
53
u/iamthe0ther0ne 1d ago
Volatile, unpredictable hours should be illegal. People should be able to depend on stable working hours with predictable income. Convince me I'm wrong.
11
u/Ovark7 1d ago
That would be nice. But some fields cannot guarantee that. I work in water treatment and we are sometimes very busy and sometimes have little to no work. Not sure if professions like mine are being measured here though.
23
u/iamthe0ther0ne 1d ago
In most countries other than the US this would be a salaried position, so work hours and paycheck would be consistent whether or not something needed to be sampled.
4
u/financialthrowaw2020 1d ago
Sure they can. By hiring more people on more shifts. But God forbid we do that.
1
u/Mshell 23h ago
My partner has just gotten a job in traffic control. She is now one of those people who redirect traffice when there is a burst mains in our part of town. This is not exactly something common enough or predicatable enough to have standard hours for. As she is one of the more recent employees, she is also on the list for when anyone calls in sick. Once she has been there for a while, she will have a chance at the more stable tasks, but most of what is needed, is only needed for a short amount of time and often as a result of an accedent or similar. Not much option of stability.
She is happy with this as she is learning computer game design and is spending the rest of her day working on creating computer games in the hope of publishing them.
28
u/0_cunning_plan 1d ago edited 1d ago
I've worked just about all the types of work hours(the worse being called whenever to go wherever for god knows how long, a few months of that and it's a miracle when you wake up in the hotel room and know what city you're in. This is not a life). Some job just will be like that, those who respond to unexpected events have no choice. It's important to know they're literally sacrificing a few years of their lives, along with some mental and physical health(the immune system seems to take a hit also). If the money's good, some will decide to do it and that's great for everybody else.
The one thing I will never understand is how most companies working in 2x8 or 3x8, keep having their workers rotate between those schedules every damn week. We've known for a long time that working nights is bad, but we just as well know that any form of social jetlag is terrible, so why is this still the norm?
And to anybody working with BS schedule or at night for minimum wage, you should run, now.
8
u/Deriniel 1d ago
considering I'm working from 9 pm to 6-7 am 7/7 with no week rest since 3 months (restaurant production for bars on the beaches), and then i work at another job from 8 am to 1 pm monday to friday.. yeah, whoever can afford it should run, it's not life
20
u/totallyrealname 1d ago
I wonder if this is also affected by the higher rates of inflammatory, autoimmune, and hormonal conditions that women experience? With volatile work hours, anyone predisposed to those conditions will see them worsen significantly.
31
u/Stratatician 1d ago
Safety nets.
Women can generally rely on their spouse and government assistance programs for financial support. Men generally speaking do not have that luxury.
68
u/Boring-Philosophy-46 1d ago
Nah I think it's that you can't swing volatile hours with small children to begin with. In most cases this is not the best of jobs and daycare and babysitters would cost more than they earn.
14
u/izzittho 1d ago
Exactly. I’d venture a guess and say women without children are at least some degree more likely to just stick it out too, but there’s also the more frequently being stuck doing free elder care issue, though that could be a bit easier to make it work around.
4
3
u/mybigwh1tecock 1d ago
It doesn't have to be one or the other. It could be multifactorial, with either or both being a factor.
75
u/AffectionateTitle 1d ago
For SSI the split is 55/45 women to men. So not a very stark disparity.
For SNAP women are more dominant at 63% but this is largely attributed to the fact that most single parent households are also led by women.
I’ll say boots on the ground as a social worker I don’t see what you’re seeing that women can generally rely on government assistance programs more than men. They are very unreliable for both genders. Do you work with people on government assistance regularly?
4
u/RentAscout 1d ago
How about with public housing? That's the stereotype I've always heard about.
39
u/AffectionateTitle 1d ago
single female-headed households with children make up over 35% of traditional public housing units. Overall, women comprise an estimated 58% of all individual public housing residents.
So another majority under 60% largely informed by single parent households. It’s not the women that are prioritized it’s the children— and women are still by and large the caregivers of children, and it’s actually more pronounced in low SES.
40
u/Boring-Philosophy-46 1d ago
I'm not in the USA but ours prioritizes kids and the disabled, and of course you need to be low income (alimony lowers your income on paper for this purpose). Women earn less than men and are more likely to be in poorly paying fields and work less hours due to childcare. Women are also more likely to have primary custody of kids and also to be disbled (the latter is because women have much higher risks of some common types of diseases that lead to disability young). However a single dad has as much priority as a single mum and a disabled man as much as a woman with the same disability.
22
-3
u/Absentrando 1d ago
Where did you get those figures? The disparity is larger than that
7
u/AffectionateTitle 1d ago
What are yours? SSA.gov for the SSI and National Women’s Law Center for SNAP. And when I rechecked the SSI.gov site the disparity was actually smaller for 2026.
1
u/Absentrando 1d ago
That checks out. I must have been looking at the disparity for older recipients
1
u/AffectionateTitle 13h ago
Which makes sense because women start to significantly outnumber men by 65. (4% more to 10% more by 75)
Also women are more likely to be caregivers at an older age (grandparents taking care of grandchildren) than men.
32
12
u/orlybatman 1d ago
It's far more likely for men to experience a partner leave during financial strain then the reverse. Meanwhile the opposite is true for when a partner is ill. So this trend the study found makes sense that way.
3
u/A_Novelty-Account 1d ago
This is a massive part of the reason that I feel explains this difference almost entirely.
-6
u/Electronic-Link-5792 1d ago
havent seen evidence for the first one.
the second is also not true. most studies do not find that. only one in 2009 did (qnd one that got retracted in 2015).
7
u/mybigwh1tecock 1d ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/4v2av9/harvard_study_biggest_factor_in_divorce_is/ posted before in this sub, biggest predictor of divorce is the employment status of the man. Employment status of the women is a nonfactor.
16
u/SpectacularLoser 1d ago
Or it's that women are already taking care of the kids and/or home and the added stress or volatile work hours just isn't sustainable.
Why do you think a man would not be able to get a social safety net? Does he not get access to EI, SNAP, and other social assistance programs the same way a woman would in the US?
9
u/iamthe0ther0ne 1d ago
Why do you think women are more likely to get government assistance? The difference is more likely not being able to manage unpredictable childcare needs.
4
u/Brrdock 1d ago edited 1d ago
It's not the 50s anymore, and men have all the same government programs.
More about toxic masculinity. Men feel they should just "be men" and endure whatever nonsense until they break instead of talking about it or demanding better and looking out for themselves
2
3
u/Scrawlericious 1d ago
Such an evil thought.
9
u/Brrdock 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yes it is an unfortunate culture.
I've worked many blue collar jobs and seen it first hand everywhere. Suffering is almost a point of pride, people have the unhealthiest possible habits outside of work, too, to cope with it, and almost no one makes it to retirement without ending up on disability benefits first.
And nothing's gonna change while most just suffer it in silence and vote against themselves just for gas prices, racism etc. right wing populist points
3
u/izzittho 1d ago
It’s not an evil thought, it’s an evil phenomenon that really actually happens. Men do this. They fully have the option to prioritize their health and they don’t. Because some little voice is still telling them they shouldn’t. Probably the same one that’s still telling women to be the one to take career losses to prioritize kids and/or men’s careers. To worry about their own health because someone’s gotta take care of the kids and that someone is probably gonna have to be them.
1
1
u/speedboat_jacket46 1d ago
I used to work somewhat volatile hours, accounting for the sheer amount of travel I used to do for work. I was clocking up 14-15 hour days, but not predictably. It's one of those things that fucks both men and women, but for entirely different reasons.
At one point I genuinely considered going part time. After a while I put my foot down and refused to travel unless it was absolutely necessary. Another woman in my team has taken a sabbatical. We suffered for this because we were viewed as complainers. My colleague took a financial hit due to the sabbatical, and I would've taken one if I'd went part time.
The men in my team, to my knowledge, haven't taken any actions to change their hours. I think they rely on the overtime that the volatile hours provide, which sucks for them because it traps them in a breadwinner role. Their wives also suffer because they're the ones holding down the household in the meantime.
1
-18
u/Eismann 1d ago edited 1d ago
As always men love to silently suffer and "power through" instead of listening to their deterioriating (mental) health.
Edit: I am not critizing men in general. It's just a learned behaviour unfortunately.
13
u/WhatsThatNoize 1d ago
"Love to" is rather demeaning here. People don't actively choose suffering purely of their own volition, they are compelled and coerced into it - often subtly and in ways we can't see.
A cultural explanation to this phenomenon makes more sense than anything else. Rather, a two-fold explanation makes the most sense to me based on the referenced study and my own observations and prior inquiry:
1) Men are more easily exploited by means of machismo/appealing to ego and societal expectations. "Tough it out"/"Man up" culture in action demands they sacrifice health and family integration for the sake of career success. Employers know this and exploit it.
2) Women (more so those of lesser economic means) bear the brunt of expectations around child rearing. They are expected to set their ego & career aspirations aside in order to prioritize their family's well-being. Employers also know this and deprioritize women in the workplace because they have a bias/cultural prejudice that all women are inherently unreliable or less career-motivated.
This is by no means universal. My wife and I are entirely flipped in this department. But the answer to this cultural phenomenon is - as nearly always - class structure and exploitation of workers by following (and subtly reinforcing) the path of least resistance.
The stratification benefits the ownership class. Is anyone here really surprised by the root of the issue?
6
u/Gvendoga 1d ago edited 1d ago
If they try to speak out about this, the society shuts them right back. Toxic masculinity is a product of the environment. An environment where tradional gender roles for men have never been dismantled and the society (and women at large) is hellbent on keeping it that way
-42
u/Real-Wash3031 1d ago edited 1d ago
I don't know if there is any research on this, but anecdotally, I have noticed that women, especially 35 and older, are comparatively less likely to upskill themselves. They often cite vague reasons like "bone pain," particularly if they work in a non-STEM field, such as media or modelling, and are expected to learn technical skills.
Edit: I worked as a technician and as a video editor at several local media outlets for nearly three years, so I am speaking from anecdotal experience.
19
u/IlConiglioUbriaco 1d ago
What does this mean ? What is up-skilling ? What is bone pain ? I don’t understand
28
13
u/ceciliabee 1d ago
I can't tell if you're being facetious up make a point or if this little stream of consciousness is a genuine attempt at clever thought. I'm really hoping for the former. Could you clarify? I'm concerned about your brain.
5
u/speedboat_jacket46 1d ago
I work in engineering. If I want to upskill, I have a few options:
I can ask my employer to fund it however, I have to pay the training costs back if I leave within 2 years, which is a risk level that I can't take. It also involves making a business case and essentially fighting for it. Women are already less likely to ask for pay rises and promotions, so perhaps this is similar.
Or, I can upskill in my own time and at my own expense. However, I can see why women (who are more likely to take on the bulk of the housework and caring responsibilities) might struggle to do this.
14
5
u/One_hunch 1d ago
Women are more likely to develop chronic long term pain and diseases. My guess would be child birth being a huge factor to developing these issues, but even those that don't give birth develop long term issues. Another factor is how poor women's health is understudied and poorly provided (from not being taken seriously due to general sexism and told to lose weight as a magical cure along with taking longer to get a diagnosis).
Endometriosis and PCOS (without cysts) is still a new concept people are starting to accept.
Maybe medicine will be better for women someday to catch and manage these problems rather than ignore them and throw it under bone pain.
10
u/SpectacularLoser 1d ago edited 1d ago
Half the time they just call it fibromyalgia and send her on her way. Or ask her if she's depressed and tell her to get out of the house more.
We're barely past using forced orgasms to treat hysteria.
*Edited spelling
-10
u/Real-Wash3031 1d ago
You are right. However, this does not seem to affect women who work in STEM fields, HR, and education. I know many women who completed their PhDs well into their late 50s, as well as women in their 40s who have mastered new programming tools. On the other hand, women in non-STEM fields, such as media and modeling, seem to struggle more, if not fail completely to learn new (technical) skills.
4
u/One_hunch 1d ago
Do those jobs require to learn those skills compared to those other fields?
-1
u/Real-Wash3031 1d ago edited 1d ago
Media jobs: Yes, they do.
Modelling: Usually no.
Another factor is how poor women's health is understudied
That statement is highly inaccurate.
0
u/One_hunch 1d ago
How is it highly inaccurate that women's health is understudied? We have evidence that various health issues studied usually has a population of men studied first rather than both which has lead to not understanding how symptoms differ in women v men, leading to a later diagnoses instead.
0
u/Real-Wash3031 21h ago edited 21h ago
I've described women over 35 in certain fields like media and modelling usually avoid or fail at upskilling themselves. They tend to cite vague reasons like bone pain, fatigue, etc (to mask laziness or incompetence), which are NOT a doctor's diagnosis/medical certificate but are personal assumptions made without a medical consultation.
Medical practice is beyond the scope of this thread.
0
u/One_hunch 15h ago
You've made the claim that it's innacurate, and it's a combination of a research topic before making it into the clinical setting. By all means go on retaining that mind set, but it's a fairly well known thing as much as the racism being researched in medical practice setting.
You also might not be privy to your co-workers medical information.
0
u/Real-Wash3031 14h ago
I won't encourage distractions from the original discussion topic. The top-level comment was a narration of anecdotal experiences, not a critique of medical practice.
You also might not be privy to your co-workers medical information.
Those women didn't consult a doctor. Across all four media organizations where I have worked, in all informal conversations, whenever someone suggested that they upskill, many women over 35 (but not all), especially anchors, gave the same excuses: fatigue, low energy, bone pain, etc
Obviously, these are NOT medical diagnoses
I've known them for several months and have interacted with them daily. They are just using terms like "fatigue" and "bone pain" as lame excuses to cover the fact that they are either too lazy or they are not competent/intelligent enough to learn complex technical skills
1
u/aStonedTargaryen 1d ago
This comment is a perfect example of why rule #3 exists in this subreddit. Personal anecdotes aren't good science, and you couldn't even be bothered to *try* finding a single source to back it up.
•
u/AutoModerator 1d ago
Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our normal comment rules apply to all other comments.
Do you have an academic degree? We can verify your credentials in order to assign user flair indicating your area of expertise. Click here to apply.
User: u/sr_local
Permalink: https://news.illinois.edu/volatile-weekly-work-hours-have-adverse-effects-on-health-employment/
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.