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Overview

It’s in a company’s best interest to offer healthcare benefits and wellness programs for its employees. Healthy employees are more productive and less likely to miss work, which saves the company money. In addition, it would be morally responsible of companies to make sure their employees are as healthy as possible by providing them with these benefits.

Dangerous jobs aren’t new. They’ve been around for a long time, and people have suffered from them. Regulators have established restrictions to limit the impact of these jobs on our health.

But what often goes unnoticed is the mental health of white-collar workers. Stress from overwork, unemployment or lack of job control has been proven to affect health negatively. From increased chances of heart attacks to higher rates of depression, the modern workplace is putting undue stress on millions of Americans. It doesn’t have to be this way. Employers need to institute positive change in the workplace so that their employees are living happy and healthy lives. This results in a win-win situation; healthy workers mean increased productivity and higher profits for businesses as well as happier employees who are more productive at work because they’re not stressed out about their personal life issues outside work hours. In these key points you’ll discover what San Francisco’s mayor did with emergency room admissions when he instituted policies that decreased them by 20%, why layoffs are bad for both employers and employees, and how America’s healthcare system differs from those in other highly developed nations like Japan, Germany or France.

Big Idea #1: Working in an unhealthy environment can be bad for your health, but it doesn’t have to be this way.

Everyone has experienced stress in the workplace. Studies show that it’s getting worse and shows no signs of abating. The American Institute of Stress reported that 80% of Americans experience regular stress at work. But if workplace stress is such a widespread phenomenon, then what are the consequences? In short, work can be detrimental to one’s health. For example, Salesforce is meant to be one of the best companies to work for in America but numerous anecdotal reports from employees report a different side to the company—one unnamed employee who joined as manager was soon compelled to take antidepressants because she felt so stressed out by her job; constantly changing schedules and demanding jobs often mean working on weekends; this led her spending around $2,000 per month on therapy and personal trainer sessions

But not everyone can afford coping techniques, particularly in the gig economy. The gig economy is characterized by short-term contracts and often low wages; some have predicted that 40 percent of the American workforce will be gig workers by 2020. Economic uncertainty leads to decreased safety on the job as well as a decline in overall health for those who work in this type of environment.

But things don’t have to be this way. An inspiring example of companies trying to do things differently is Aetna. After CEO Mark Bertolini suffered a terrible skiing accident in 2004, he developed an interest in health and wellness, which led him to rethink his company’s attitude toward employee well-being. In 2015, Aetna instituted a minimum hourly wage of $16 per hour for all employees at the company’s lowest level. This lead to a 33 percent pay increase for those employees and improved their overall health insurance package as well as free meditation classes that helped them reduce stress by 28 percent and improve sleep quality by 20 percent over the next year. What’s more, the company saw healthcare costs decrease by 7 percent during that same time period because caring about employee well-being was actually good for both sides financially—the cost savings on healthcare outweighed any additional wages paid out when factoring in lower turnover rates (lowering hiring costs) and higher productivity levels among happier workers who were able to work better together due to having healthier lives outside of work hours as well as fewer sick days taken off from work thanks to less stress during working hours thanks to meditation classes offered through Aetna Health Insurance Company!