“Now is the time for LA to insist on Healthy Work” says Dr. Marnie Dobson of The Healthy Work Campaign.

From the Great Resignation to “Quiet Quitting” to confronting mental health conditions such as burnout, the American workplace has been undergoing revolutionary changes. Much needs to be done to protect workers from overwork, abusive/toxic workplaces, retaliation, bullying, discrimination, and harassment.

“Working people are in crisis in American workplaces,” says Dr. Dobson. “But we believe workers are the change they are looking for. They can’t do it alone. Work stress is not an individual problem–its root causes are in the workplace. So change needs to be collective and collaborative.”

“We need to transform the American workplace. It will require a huge movement of awareness,” says Dr. Peter Schnall, a renowned leader in the study of work stress for almost 40 years. He recently announced his retirement as Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Irvine to serve as the full-time Director of the nonprofit Center for Social Epidemiology and co-director of the Healthy Work Campaign.

Drs. Schnall and Dobson have worked for several decades doing research with working people, unions and employers in and around Los Angeles–including bus and rail operators at the Los Angeles Metropolitan Rail Authority, firefighters at the Orange County Fire Authority, hotel house cleaners, and Verizon communications workers.

The Healthy Work Campaign is now launching their scientifically-validated Healthy Work Survey, a free online tool for individuals and organizations to assess sources of stress in the workplace. According to Dr. Schnall, “Among many work stress researchers and advocates, this survey is considered a vital first step towards enabling changes to make work safer and healthier. It permits working people and managers to identify the important work stressors contributing to mental illnesses such as burnout and depression as well as causes of high blood pressure and heart disease.

Many of these workers face daily stressful work which only worsened with the COVID-19 pandemic. The published research shows that many work stressors can be reduced or prevented when organizations engage with workers and their union representatives to come up with feasible solutions.

The Healthy Work Campaign’s mission is to create a positive impact on organizations and workers at every level of society. “Work stress has reached epidemic proportions in America and around the world. Unfortunately, the U.S. lags behind other developed, high-income nations when it comes to addressing the causes and detrimental effects of work stress,” says Dr. Schnall.

The goals of the HWC are to create healthy working conditions that support workers, give workers a voice, protect their right to organize a union, to be family members, and to grow and thrive.

By partnering with individual workers, labor organizations and businesses, the Campaign seeks to redesign workplaces into healthier environments, improving the health and well-being of all workers. These improvements will reduce health problems and contribute to higher productivity, leading to a healthier bottom line for businesses. "Healthy work is good for workers. Healthy work is good for business."