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Resources for Workers & Unions
Explore our wide range of resources to support workers and unions in their path to healthy work and improved worker health.
Why Prioritize Work Stress?
Worker health & safety is fundamental to the labor movement. Over 60% of U.S. workers report high levels of work stress, and poor mental health, resulting from poor working conditions.
These sources of stress at work, also called “psychosocial hazards”, can cause burnout, depression, musculoskeletal disorders, injuries, higher blood pressure, and cardiovascular disease.
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Schedule a Work Stress Education Workshop or Training
Want to know more about how work stress harms the health, safety and well-being of working people? Do you want to engage your health & safety leaders and members about reducing hazardous sources of stress in the workplace? Book a training or workshop with one of our expert HWC team members.
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How to use the Healthy Work Survey
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Worker Education
Train the trainer
Strategies for Workers
As individuals, we are often told to work hard and not complain. We might hear “just be glad you have a job.” What other choices do we have? Leaving a job is not always feasible, and doesn’t guarantee a better one will be around the corner. But we also have a right to a safe and healthy workplace. Where can you start?
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Hear Worker Stories
Learn from workers about the impact of work stress on their health and what they have done about it.
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End to End Stress: One Workers’ Journey
Read what Louis reveals about working as a bus driver in New York
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The Toll on Relationships: One Spouse’s Story
Read what one video game developer’s spouse had to say about required long work hours.
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Overcoming Challenges, Working with Others
Read what Raul in Tennessee did to combat unsafe working conditions in construction.
Read moreStrategies for Unions
Find quick answers to common queries about healthy work.
Collective Bargaining
- Bargaining for the Common Good
- Collective bargaining agreements (contracts) designed to improve working conditions and job security for Brown University dining services workers
- Collective bargaining agreement (contract) designed to improve working conditions and reduce stressors for Rutgers University faculty, graduate and teaching assistants
- Contract Language to Reduce Job Stress in Education & Healthcare (Summary)
- First collective bargaining agreement for airport workers and security officers at New York and New Jersey airports
- Jim Beam workers achieve better work-life balance through new labor-management contract
- New contract for Los Angeles teachers includes important features designed to reduce teachers’ job stress
- New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) contract with private hospitals in New York City focuses on improving safe nurse staffing levels
- Reducing workplace bullying through a union-sponsored Respectful Workplace Policy and collective bargaining
- Safe Rates: Making road transport safe, fair and sustainable – international campaigns and Korean research
- SAG-AFTRA creates code of conduct to prevent sexual harassment in the workplace
- Trade union actions to prevent psychosocial risks in healthcare (E.U.)
- Work-life balance and trade unions
Workplace Participatory Research
Health Care
Manufacturing
Public Sector Workers
Supervisor Support and Work-life balance
Teachers/Education
Transit Workers – bus drivers
- Action research intervention with urban bus drivers in Copenhagen, Denmark
- Bathroom access for bus drivers in the US and Canada
- Intervention to reduce job stress among urban bus drivers in Stockholm, Sweden
- Preventing threats and violence against bus drivers
- Programs and policies to reduce work stress among bus drivers in the United States and Canada
Workplace bullying/discrimination/violence
Laws and Regulations
Unions or worker groups initiated many of these legislative efforts to improve working conditions, but most have not been scientifically studied to determine their effectiveness. However, laws and regulations also typically reach more people than the workplace-based programs that have been studied, and provide a legal requirement to reduce job stressors. The case reports were based on articles, reports or news stories from health professionals and from union publications. There are also links directly to a report, toolkit, or other external resources.
U.S. State Legislation and Regulations
- New California Labor Laws in Effect in 2024
- Laws and regulation to prevent workplace violence in healthcare
- Laws prohibiting mandatory overtime for nurses
- Laws to improve nurse staffing levels in hospitals in the U.S.
- Legislation to prevent workplace sexual harassment
- Legislation to reduce job stress in education & healthcare (summary)
- Work scheduling laws contribute to more stable employment
- Workplace bullying prevention laws and regulations
U.S. National Healthy Work-Related Policy/Guidelines
- U.S. Surgeon General’s Framework for Workplace Mental Health and Well-being
- OSHA Workplace Stress: Make Work Better - Mental Health Matters
- NIOSH Science Blogs - Want to Improve the Well-Being of Health Workers? The System Itself Must Change, December 19, 2023
- NIOSH Science Blog - An Urgent Call to Address Work-related Psychosocial Hazards and Improve Worker Well-being, April 10, 2024
- Unions press feds for more workplace mental health protections, Axios Sept 20, 2023
International Work Stress Prevention Standards or Guidelines
Along with international standards or policies, many countries worldwide have work stress prevention policies, guidelines, standards, or laws.
- The ILO Decent Work Agenda in the U.S.
- ISO 45003:2021(en) Occupational health and safety management — Psychological health and safety at work — Guidelines for managing psychosocial risks
- WHO Healthy Workplace Model and Framework
- Job redesign and national labor protections have positive effects on worker health and the economy
Australia
Canada
- A national standard for psychological health and safety in the workplace in Canada
- National Standard of Canada for Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace, Canadian Mental Health Commission & Standards Council of Canada, 2013
- Government labor inspectors’ role in protecting workers’ mental health in Quebec
Europe
- EU Strategic Framework on health and safety at work 2014-2020
- European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (EU OSHA) Guidelines: Provisions on workload, ergonomic and psychosocial risks
- Psychosocial Risk Management in the Workplace (Guidance and Tools) WHO PRIMA-EF consortium; World Health Organization, 2008
- Management of psychosocial risks in European workplaces: evidence from the Second European Survey of Enterprises on New and Emerging Risks (ESENER-2)
- Legislation to prevent psychosocial risks in healthcare (E.U.)
- Danish Executive Order and Danish Working Environment Authority Guidelines On Reducing Sources of Stress at Work
- Finnish Government Proposes Ruling to Define Employment Relations in Unclear Situations
Japan
- Stress Check: A national policy in Japan for prevention of workplace stress
- Japanese Stress Check Program – National Policy, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, Japan. 2015 (Japanese)
- Kawakami and Tsutsumi. The Stress Check Program: a new national policy for monitoring and screening psychosocial stress in the workplace in Japan. Journal of Occupational Health 2016
- Kawakami, Park, Dollard, Dai. Chapter 2: National Status of Psychosocial Factors at Work in Japan, Korea, Australia and China. In: Psychosocial Factors at Work in the Asia Pacific. Springer 2014
United Kingdom
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank and acknowledge the many people who wrote and reviewed these case studies, not the least of which Paul Landsbergis, PhD, MPH, Principal Investigator for the Healthy Work Toolkit, who supervised the development, review, and completion of each case study, in addition to researching and writing a number of them.
This project was made possible, in large part, by the dedication of Dr. Landsbergis’ SUNY Downstate School of Public Health graduate students, who researched and drafted many of the case studies, and whose time was funded by a grant from the Center for Social Epidemiology. We greatly appreciate and acknowledge:
- Jeanine Botta
- Daphne Brown
- Rivka Franklin
- Yocheved Halberstam
- Christopher Jimenez
- Marie-Anne Rosemberg
- Elina Shtridler
Additionally, for their review and helpful comments, we warmly thank and acknowledge:
- Alex Bryson
- Bill Borwegen
- Mark Catlin
- Ellen Cobb
- Marnie Dobson
- Mahée Gilbert-Ouimet
- Leslie Hammer
- David Holman
- Katherine Lippel
- Jane Lipscomb
- Minnesota Association of Public Employees
- New York State Nursing Association
- Jonathan Rosen
- Glenn Shor
- Jan Thomason
- Xavier Trudel
- Kurt Wahlstedt
FAQs
Find answers to common questions about our resources for workers and unions, how they may benefit you, and how you can get in touch for additional support.
- Subscribe to our newsletter to stay informed about the campaign
- Follow us on social media, amplify our message, and tag us @healthyworknow with the hashtag #healthywork
- Take our Healthy Work Survey for Individuals
- Schedule a workshop/training for you and your co-workers
- Make use of our Strategies for Workers resource section on this page
- Power our mission with a simple one-time or monthly donation
- Build our capacity by making use of your employer matching program
Interested in addressing work stress among your membership? Check out our Strategies for Unions resource section on this page.