"Labour Casualization and the Psychosocial Health of Workers in Australia"

by McGann, Michael; White, Kevin; Moss, Jeremy (2016)

Abstract

This article presents the results of a qualitative study of 72 workers in regional Victoria, Australia. Against the background of the growing casualization of the workforce it demonstrates the impact on the health and well-being of these workers, focusing on the intersection between psychosocial working conditions and health. In particular it focuses on the detrimental impact on workers? sense of self-efficacy and self-esteem. It emphasizes how the job insecurity characteristic of non-standard work extends beyond the fear of job loss to involve uncertainty over the scheduling of work, with debilitating consequences for workers? autonomy, self-efficacy and control over their lives. Additionally, it is argued that the exclusion of these workers from paid leave and other entitlements in the workplace confers a lower social status on these workers that is corrosive of their self-esteem. It is these key socio-psychological mechanisms that provide the link between insecure work and workers? health.

Keywords

Automation, Machines, Technology, Information Technology, Casualisation, Nursing, Medicine, Health Care, Health Service Work, Psychology, Health, Australian Context, Precarity

Themes

Precarious Work, Burnout, Health and Work, Capitalism

Links to Reference

• https://doi.org/10.1177/0950017016633022
• http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0950017016633022
• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0950017016633022
• https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0950017016633022

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