Worker stress reflects not only heavier demands in recent years, but the fears and difficulties of the Great Recession that preceded the recovery as well as ongoing economic uncertainty.  In effect, employees have been under sometimes-severe strain for roughly four years.  Bigger workloads might be easier to shoulder if employees were getting raises, as well.  But by and large they aren’t. In the Workforce Management-Workplace Options survey, just 30 percent of those employees reporting an increase in job duties said they got a pay increase as well.   And government data show that inflation-adjusted average hourly earnings fell 1.6 percent from October 2010 to October 2011.Still, some observers say workers should get used to the present business as usual.  Given doubts about the government’s ability to reduce unemployment rates anytime soon, employers may be able to make always-on “superjobs” the standard rather than the exception. Companies have seen a spurt in productivity, but it may not be a lasting one. Wayne Hochwarter, a management professor at Florida State University in Tallahassee, surveyed more than 700 full-time workers in 2011 and found that employees in a demanding work environment said their job performance had risen.  But their anxiety levels at work and home also rose, while their job satisfaction fell.  Especially when increased demands come with factors like layoff fears and poor communication by the boss and company, heightened worker productivity is likely to be short-lived, Hochwarter says. “The toll on the human system leads to deteriorating performance and effort,” he says. “The person is left with an empty tank.”

via Today’s Workforce—Pressed and Stressed – Featured Article – Workforce.

The hamsters are dying.