Work precarity and vulnerability

This project will examine the job quality of injured workers in Canada. Its overarching goal is to provide a comprehensive and dynamic portrait of working life before and after work injury.

Status: Ongoing

Compared to those in standard employment, workers in precarious jobs are more than three times as likely to die from drug poisoning and nearly twice as likely to die from alcohol-related causes. The risk of suicide is also markedly higher—2.4 times greater for women and 1.7 times greater for men in precarious work, reports Shane Mercer, based on a webinar presentation by IWH associate scientist Dr. Faraz Vahid Shahidi. The findings challenge the notion that having any job is enough to safeguard health, instead pointing to job quality as a critical, and often overlooked, determinant of life expectancy.

Published: Canadian Occupational Safety, April 2025

Life expectancy is stalling in Canada and other high-income countries. These trends are partly due to rising “deaths of despair,” a term that some researchers use to describe suicide, drug poisoning, and alcohol-related mortality. In this presentation, Dr. Faraz Vahid Shahidi examines the link between job quality—whether one has a “good” or “bad” job—and deaths of despair in the Canadian workforce. He asks whether people in precarious employment, which is insecure and unrewarding, are more likely to suffer an early death due to suicide, drug poisoning, or alcohol-related causes. He also discusses the role job quality can play in improving population health and stemming the rise of deaths of despair.

Published: April 2025

In Canada and other high-income countries, rates of suicide, drug poisoning, and alcohol-attributable mortality—sometimes referred to as “deaths of despair”—have increased over time. An IWH study investigated whether job quality—measured in terms of employment stability, hours and wages—is linked to these causes of deaths.

Published: April 2025

Published: Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, April 2025

Published: American Journal of Epidemiology, February 2025

Published: SSM - Population Health, January 2025

Published: New Solutions, January 2025

Filling your spare time with side hustles can put more money in your pocket, but what will it cost you? In an episode of Ontario Today, host Amanda Pfeffer and guest Deena Ladd take calls from listeners. They also mention an IWH study on the link between injury risks and precarious work, conducted by Dr. Faraz Vahid Shahidi (at 24m 24s).

Published: CBC Radio One, September 2024

Workers in jobs where precarious employment conditions are more common are more likely to experience a work-related injury or illness in Ontario, including COVID-19. That’s according to a pair of studies authored by Institute for Work & Health (IWH) researchers that examined whether employment conditions—for example, temporary contracts, involuntary part-time hours, irregular schedules and low wages—may be linked to the rate of work injuries.

Published: September 2024