The Hindu Business Line : Corporate downsizing

IT'S now a scientifically proven fact: certain business practices typical of free market economies are injurious to your health. Downsizing, for instance.

A recent Finnish study indicates that corporate downsizing doubles the risk of death from cardiovascular disease for those laid off and seriously impacts the health of those who survive redundancy because they are left with more work, less control over their work and a heightened sense of job insecurity.

As cardiovascular disease develops over several years, the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, which conducted the study, concedes that it is entirely likely that it may well have been present in the employees who died because of it... but points out that the stress of downsizing can trigger a heart attack or stroke.

The researchers believe that the risks of death from cardiovascular disease may actually be higher than suggested by their study. They hold this view as they found that employees who get to keep their jobs are, on an average, healthier than those who lose their jobs. Further, women under 62, who are at less risk of cardiovascular disease, outnumbered men in the study by nearly three to one.

While this study is one of the first to demonstrate the health risks associated with downsizing, earlier studies have revealed a link between coronary heart disease and rank. The so-called "Whitehall study," for instance, has demonstrated that people working at the bottom of the organisational totem-pole are significantly more likely to develop coronary heart disease that those placed in the higher levels of the hierarchy.

There's more bad news: The relationship between an employee and a boss too may have critical, long-term health implications... for the former.

According to recent research published by scientists at the UK's Buckinghamshire Chilterns University College, overbearing bosses can spike their employees' blood pressure to levels that significantly increase the risk of heart attack and stroke. The scientists found that perceptions about a boss's interpersonal fairness had the most impact on employees' blood pressure.

Is there any way in which people who have to work for a living can survive the hire-and-fire policy increasingly adopted by firms operating in free market economies?

Well, they probably can if they are not obsessive about becoming an MBA and take up science or engineering or medicine.

A Queens University Belfast (Northern Ireland) survey of 10,000 male graduates of Glasgow University suggests that science, engineering and medical students run a demonstrably lower risk of mortality than arts students. However, before breaking out the champagne, medical students would be well advised to take note of the additional finding that putative pill-rollers have a record for the largest number of alcohol-related deaths and death from suicide or violent means. They also tend to be the heaviest smokers as students, followed only by lawyers. The researchers hold that the comparatively high incidence of alcohol-related deaths and suicides among medical students is probably linked to the extended hours they put in and the stress caused thereby.

As for the lower death rates from all causes among the scientists, engineers and medical professionals, the researchers say that this could be related to social and economic factors in as much as they find it somewhat easier to land jobs with stability and a satisfactory income level.

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