Bad Bosses Are Bad For Your Health
by Davana Pilczuk, American Funeral Director Journal
We are all familiar with the phrase “a happy wife means a happy life,” and science has shown that statement to be true. Numerous studies have found that the person we marry has a greater impact on our health and stress levels than probably anyone else in our lives. But did you know that your boss is also another crucial person who can profoundly impact your health? And if you consider how many decades most of us have been in the workforce, working for the right person can make all the difference in the world regarding our productivity levels and physical and mental health states.
One 2009 study, performed by the Stress Institute at Stockholm University, examined over 3,000 working men over 10 years and found that people who had bad managers also had higher rates of chest pain, heart attack, and even death. Men ages 19 to 70 years, had their hearts checked at work between 1992 and 1995. In 2003, hospital records for heart disease were checked for heart disease illness. The people working for toxic managers had an increase in heart disease risk by 25 percent. According to the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, there was a cumulative health effect: the longer the employee worked for a bad boss, the worse the health effects. People working for a bad manager for more than four years had a 64% higher risk of heart disease.