Overworked, Vacation-Starved America Ranks #1 in Depression, Mental Health Problems

[marmar]

via AlterNet:



Overworked, Vacation-Starved America Ranks #1 in Depression, Mental Health Problems

By Silja J.A. Talvi, In These Times. Posted November 13, 2008.

U.S. workers' lives are beginning to look a lot like they did 100 years ago when 14-hour days were the norm.



Jack Torrance, Jack Nicholson's character in the 1980 film The Shining, should get credit for popularizing (and making terrifying) a proverb that dates as far back as the mid-1600s: "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."

Nicholson's character sure looked like he could have used a vacation before his psyche disintegrated and he went on a murderous rampage.

In the real world, the danger isn't that we'll start obsessively and repeatedly typing proverbs at the Overlook Hotel before taking an ax to the door (one would hope), but that our country's hard-working denizens will keep getting sicker, sadder, less productive and more miserable.

Medical and poll-based evidence indicates that we seriously need relief. Work-related stress can lead to sudden heart attacks, obesity, anxiety and depression. A World Health Organization and Harvard Medical School study last year put the United States at the top of the list of depressed (or otherwise mentally disordered) countries, while the Gallup Daily Happiness-Stress Index finds that the only consistent upswing in mood occur when Americans get some time off on the weekends or holidays.

As John de Graaf, executive director of the Seattle-based advocacy group Take Back Your Time, puts it, Americans are "time-starved and vacation-starved." ........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/106830/overworked%2C_vacation-starved_america_ranks_%231_in_depression%2C_mental_health_problems/

[leftofthedial]

1. vacation?

how can anyone afford a vacation anymore?

[MountainLaurel]

4. Vacation get-away or vacation-time

I spend most of my vacation time on visits to my and my partner's family, since we don't live close anymore, or on taking the dogs to the vet, waiting for the plumber to show up, job interviews, and other not-so-fun tasks. The last time I took a vacation for pleasure was my honeymoon, more than three years ago.

[hlthe2b]

6. When increasingly people are working multiple jobs just to pay

the monthly bills? Our country has become a horrendous mess under RW policies-- Ayn Rand and her brand of "selfishness without regret"....


No health care and increasingly the world's highest risk for chronic disease... Can't have that dreaded socialism, after all...:eyes:

[greguganus]

2. The only ones that can afford vacations these days are the mental health workers. n/t

[lib2DaBone]

3. While worker productivity has SURGED.....

wages and benefits cut since 1980. Thanks to Republican Trickle Down we have been sold on the open market to the highest bidder and, "..worked like a rented mule". The bankster/gangsters stuffed their pockets with cash while Fox News and Mega Churches lulled us to sleep.

[Matariki]

5. My parents generation - one person could support a family

Now two people work 40+ hours and have to juggle that with child rearing and home maintenance, and still struggle financially. We've been cheated.

[JHB]

8. They used to complain about that as "the rat race"...

...compared to that, these days are more like a free-for-all knife fight in a viper pit.

[riverwalker]

7. meanwhile, in "socialist Norway"

My eyes were opened on a recent trip. Everyone I met (NOT wealthy people, mind you, just average) has a little summer cottage second home, has 6-8 weeks vacation, goes somewhere warm in the winter. Add to this the guaranteed healthcare and pensions, and education, PAID parental leave, they have it pretty good.
Yeah, the taxes are high, yeah the cost of living is high, but I didn't hear anyone complaining....