Thursday, January 6, 2022

Depression Linked to Lost Income

According to research by the Institute for Work & Health (IWH), in the 10 years following a major depressive episode, men lost $115,000 in earnings, and women lost $71,000 in earnings. In the year of the episode, men lost $5,000 and women lost $4,500. This is not surprising, as these workers often took time off work, stepped back from their careers, or even switched jobs.

Yet in the following years, men fell behind by $730 to $1,800 per year, and women lost $360 per year. Why?

“It may be that employers are more reluctant to promote or offer pay increases to people they see as less productive,” says Kathleen Dobson, the IWH research associate who led the study. “It may be that people with depression stay in lower-paying jobs, potentially to keep their health benefits, or don’t switch to higher-paying jobs for fear of the work stress that may entail. Or perhaps people don’t have stable employment over the decade following a depressive episode.”

In other words, we don’t quite know, and we need to do more research.

How do we know that this drop in earnings was due to depression, and not other correlative factors?

Dobson’s team was careful to pair each individual survey respondent who had depression with another respondent who didn’t have depression but was otherwise like them in terms of gender, age, immigrant status, marital status, race, economic status, education, etc.

This large, long term drop in earnings is concerning, particularly as Dobson found in an earlier study that 5.4 percent of workers suffer a major depressive episode in any given year. This number rises to 11.7 percent of unemployed Canadians and 9.8 percent of Canadians not in the labour force.

If you are struggling with your mental health and are a member of a CLAC benefits plan, you can access resources through LifeWorks (workhealthlife.com), CLAC’s employee and family assistance program provider. Remember to talk to your family doctor, as they can also help you access various resources. And if you are concerned that your mental health is impacting your work, talk to your steward or representative.

Source: iwh.on.ca

Depression Linked to Lost Income

You might be interested in