“When I was sitting around at home I would just get grumpy. I’ve also lost five stone since working here. This is like a vitality camp for me.” Retired British Transport Police inspector Brendan McCambridge, 56, interviewed in The Telegraph, describes how his new role at Waitrose has improved his life. He is one of…
Tag: Unemployment
Downshifting and long-term part-time work could be key to a healthy retirement
A secure, comfortable and healthy retirement is something most of us aspire to. But, as we live longer, we are all being encouraged to work later, increasingly well into our late 60s, so what might that mean for those aspirations, particularly the desire to be fit and healthy? Whilst the number crunchers have done their…
Out of work and overweight: Think again.
There’s a widely held preconception that people who are out of work are overweight, perpetuated by the media and, indeed, reinforced by some academic studies. But recent robust evidence throws a whole new light on things and indicates that unemployed people are in fact much more likely to be underweight, and less likely to be…
Having any job at all is better than being unemployed, right?
“Bad work just doesn’t fit in 2017!” Those are the words of Matthew Taylor, head of the Government’s recent review of modern work practices, who has called on politicians to make “all work good.” In an interview with the BBC, Mr Taylor, said that, as well as being bad for productivity and the economy, poor…
Retiring early: the links with childhood
When we think of why someone might retire early, our minds are unlikely to make the leap to their childhood for the answer. But a group of researchers interested in what sorts of things affect our later working lives, believe that early retirement may indeed have some of its roots in our younger years. The…
Frailty: what is the connection with our working lives?
People are living longer, and the number of over-65s is expected to reach around one in four of the UK population by 2050. But is retirement a golden age, or will we be dogged by poor health? Wentian Lu from University College London and colleagues investigated how our working pattern throughout our lives affects our…
Want to be fit at forty? Don’t have a baby early!
Having a family early may not be good for your health later on. That was the conclusion of a team of researchers at the ESRC International centre for Lifecourse Studies when they looked at the interplay between the work and family lives of men and women, whose lives have been tracked over time in the…
Out of work again? The psychological impacts of repeated unemployment
Being unemployed is bad for our mental well-being, but if we lose our job more than once does the psychological blow lessen in some way? Researchers Cara Booker from the University of Essex and Amanda Sacker at the International Centre for Lifecourse Studies at UCL used the long-running British Household Panel Survey to examine the…
Having a baby early? It might not be good for you later
Being employed is generally good for your health. That’s what a large body of research has shown over the years. But what about when you put having a family into the mix? That’s a question that Dr Anne McMunn at the ESRC International Centre for Lifecourse Studies at UCL has been asking in a series…
Does having a rotten job in middle age leave us depressed in retirement?
People’s working conditions have been high up the news agenda recently and not just in non European parts of the world either. Understandably, considerable concern has been expressed about the impact that low paid jobs with poor and uncertain conditions have on workers’ lives. But what are the impacts of poor or stressful working conditions…