Health Consequences of the ‘Great Recession’ on the Employed

Sepideh Modrek, Stanford University
Mark Cullen, Stanford University

While the negative consequences of unemployment on the unemployed have been well studied, the potential spillover effects for those who remain employed after layoffs are less well understood. The recent economic downturn created an opportunity to explore individual-level perceptions of work stress, utilization of employee assistance programs (EAP), and the new onset of health conditions for survivors of mass layoffs in the context of a large multi-site, fully-insured aluminum company, Alcoa. We use the company’s human resources data, workers’ responses to a company-wide survey, utilization of EAP services, and linked health claims data to explore these spillover effects across 30 plants. Preliminary results indicate that there were increased perceptions of work stress for remaining salaried workers. Likewise, we found increased EAP utilization rates for some common concerns. We also found some evidence for new diagnoses of hypertension and diabetes.