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Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?

Precarious employment can negatively affect health, but workers may be healthy if they earn enough income. This study uses equivalent disposable income and examines the interaction between income classes and employment types to clarify whether workers’ health improves as the income classes rise. In...

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Autores principales: Nishikitani, Mariko, Nakao, Mutsuhiro, Inoue, Mariko, Tsurugano, Shinobu, Yano, Eiji
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9317295/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35877818
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicines9070040
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author Nishikitani, Mariko
Nakao, Mutsuhiro
Inoue, Mariko
Tsurugano, Shinobu
Yano, Eiji
author_facet Nishikitani, Mariko
Nakao, Mutsuhiro
Inoue, Mariko
Tsurugano, Shinobu
Yano, Eiji
author_sort Nishikitani, Mariko
collection PubMed
description Precarious employment can negatively affect health, but workers may be healthy if they earn enough income. This study uses equivalent disposable income and examines the interaction between income classes and employment types to clarify whether workers’ health improves as the income classes rise. In Japan, nonstandard workers, called nonregular employees, have remained high since 2013. Therefore, using data from the national cross-sectional Comprehensive Survey of Living Conditions 2013, an official survey performed in Japan, we targeted a sample of employees aged 18 to 45 who graduated during the economic recession. Our final sample included 8282 employees (4444 males and 3838 females). The health (general and mental) status indicators used the dichotomized self-rated health and scores of the K6 questionnaires scored in the national survey. The association between income and health was almost proportional. Female workers tended to improve their health as their income class increased; however, this tendency was not observed in male workers, especially nonregular employees. Although the associations were weakened by added income information on the regression models, nonregular employees always showed inferior health to regular employees. The health status of nonregular employees, especially female nonregular employees, is statistically significantly lower than that of regular employees, even when the economic class is similar. In conclusion, improving low incomes for nonregular employees could improve health challenges, but income alone may not result in the same health status for regular and nonregular employees.
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spelling pubmed-93172952022-07-27 Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted? Nishikitani, Mariko Nakao, Mutsuhiro Inoue, Mariko Tsurugano, Shinobu Yano, Eiji Medicines (Basel) Article Precarious employment can negatively affect health, but workers may be healthy if they earn enough income. This study uses equivalent disposable income and examines the interaction between income classes and employment types to clarify whether workers’ health improves as the income classes rise. In Japan, nonstandard workers, called nonregular employees, have remained high since 2013. Therefore, using data from the national cross-sectional Comprehensive Survey of Living Conditions 2013, an official survey performed in Japan, we targeted a sample of employees aged 18 to 45 who graduated during the economic recession. Our final sample included 8282 employees (4444 males and 3838 females). The health (general and mental) status indicators used the dichotomized self-rated health and scores of the K6 questionnaires scored in the national survey. The association between income and health was almost proportional. Female workers tended to improve their health as their income class increased; however, this tendency was not observed in male workers, especially nonregular employees. Although the associations were weakened by added income information on the regression models, nonregular employees always showed inferior health to regular employees. The health status of nonregular employees, especially female nonregular employees, is statistically significantly lower than that of regular employees, even when the economic class is similar. In conclusion, improving low incomes for nonregular employees could improve health challenges, but income alone may not result in the same health status for regular and nonregular employees. MDPI 2022-07-14 /pmc/articles/PMC9317295/ /pubmed/35877818 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicines9070040 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Nishikitani, Mariko
Nakao, Mutsuhiro
Inoue, Mariko
Tsurugano, Shinobu
Yano, Eiji
Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title_full Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title_fullStr Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title_full_unstemmed Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title_short Associations between Workers’ Health and Working Conditions: Would the Physical and Mental Health of Nonregular Employees Improve If Their Income Was Adjusted?
title_sort associations between workers’ health and working conditions: would the physical and mental health of nonregular employees improve if their income was adjusted?
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9317295/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35877818
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/medicines9070040
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