March 29, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

Upset? Daily stress affects 25% of U.S. workers> Gallup survey of 705 adults nothing to fret about on the job

At work, there’s a vast pile of papers spread across your desk like granite in a quarry, and you feel you’ve been given only a butter knife to handle it all.

Tranquilizers have replaced your daily regimen of perk-me-up coffee. You’re gaining a better understanding of the “disgruntled employee” phenomenon.

If this describes you, you’re not alone.

Each day, a fourth of U.S. workers are affected by the pressures of workplace stress, according to a survey conducted by the Gallup Organization. The October survey of 705 adults was done for accountants on call, a placement agency for accountants and bookkeepers. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Among its findings is that three-quarters of workers are bothered by stress in the workplace, including nearly one-third who are stressed at least once or twice a week. For another quarter of us, however, the prospects are even worse. For 25 percent, head-pounding, nerve-wracking, fist-clenching stress is a daily occurrence.

Surprise, surprise.

Not everyone, however, succumbs to the pressures of living in a fast-paced world.

One in 10 workers has managed to find the secret of a stress-free workplace, although it is unclear whether it involves heavy sedation or is akin to the workplace of one of those “unnecessary” government workers. In the survey, 10 percent reported never being bothered by stress.

Based on the survey results, stress is an equal opportunity condition, seeming not to favor either gender. But it does seem to have a preference for the older generations.

Workers under 30 were nearly 10 percent less likely to experience job-related stress on a daily basis than those over 30. Twenty-seven percent of those over 30 reported daily stress, compared with 19 percent of those under 30.

And in an apparent disincentive for sending your kids off to college, stress was reported more widely among those who have college degrees than those who don’t. Of the college graduates surveyed, 44 percent reported a daily ebb and flow of pressures at work, compared with 35 percent of the noncollege graduates.

Maybe it has something to do with responsibilities.

If you’re one of the stressed workers, you can either accept it and join the crowd, or look for one of those one-in-10 jobs that are stress-free. Good luck, and stay calm.


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