Women in the public service go on disability leave at almost twice the rate of men, a problem some experts say should be addressed as part of the government’s new disability management scheme.
The federal disability insurance plan, managed by Sun Life Financial, is the biggest in Canada. A Sun Life report obtained by the Citizen shows women have ended up on long-term disability at rates vastly disproportionate to their numbers in the public service for more than a decade, especially for mental health conditions.
(h/t Kevin B.)
Disability? Isn’t that just a pension benefit anybody would be a fool not to take?
Mental health issues? Understandable. They’re all Liberals after all. they start out crazy and go downhill from there.
So is disability the new “sugardaddy”? Seems so!
The federal bureaucrats, who set RCMP policy, have announced their goal is to have 50% of RCMP officers be women.
Read into that, what you will.
Back in my Silicon Valley days, I once worked for a department headed by a woman. Counting her, there were four women in the department. There were also four men. The four men added together didn’t take as much sick time as the woman who took the least.
Of course, the woman who headed the department was promoted to vice-president not long after that.
my first job in a finance company – no women – there was even a policy that suggested firing women who announced their engagement – as they would leave their job. Not female friendly.
We got our first female collector. She had worked for a competitor but had gone on disability leave. She worked long enough to qualify – and went on disability leave.
In government, probably 1/3 of women I worked with took disability – from management jobs – as soon as they could.
The natural response would be to make such claims more difficult. Fat chance of that.
“A Statistics Canada report found that Canada’s public servants are absent — including on disability — more than workers in the private sector, and that much of that difference can be explained because they are unionized, a higher proportion are women, and they are older than the rest of the labour force.”
If the money is there for stress leave, you get what you pay for.
On their own women network much better than men. Where the network is imposed (work) there tends to be stress. Maybe the percentage of women who enjoy going to work every day is lower than for men.
My limited experience inside the beast (government) showed that everyone had a different mindset than those of us from outside. They are virtually all ‘players’ of their system. I suspect it is designed to be played.
It just shows that the women have mastered the game better than their male counterparts. I would also suspect the largest cohort are those with children and have found a way to be paid to be at home with pay and benefits.
Nice gig if you can get us to pay for it…. oh ya, I guess they found a way.
Dose that include the inability to think? which is quite prevelent amounst liberals but especialy liberal demacratsllywood wanks and journalists
The solution to the problem of time off from work is to own your own small business.
You CAN’T take time off because YOU ARE the business. There are no subsidies or programmes or benefits. It’s amazing how little time off is required and how much work can be accomplished when there is no choice in the matter.
“Have to” is a great master.
One point to note here. A big whack of soldiers claim PTSD. The civil service is simply no different. You don’t go crazy from war anymore than you go crazy from being a mid level manager in the civil service. The problem is working for government turns people into useless human beings. The time limit for long-term disability should be a year or two and then you hit the bricks. If I go crazy, everything is on my dime. Perhaps that is why I have never gone crazy.
Don’t pay a lot of attention to a newspaper article written by people with little knowledge of what they are talking about…
Sun Life is an insurance company like any other, and the employees pay into it like any other large company group benefit. Nobody gets on their disability program without a thorough review of the medical need by Sun Life’s own medical reviewers, and they’re not push-overs, by a long shot. Current Federal Sun Life long term disability programs have a 2 year service window. After that, you go on CPP disability. There is no short-term disability plan – you wait 13 weeks before being eligible for the Sun Life long term plan (which is why there is an accruable sick leave benefit.) They all end at age 65. A 25 year disability is exceedingly rare (never seen one longer than 6-8 years…) and likely related to a permanent injury on the job. Feds generally declare you unfit after 2-4 years off-strength on disability (i.e. not getting paid wages.)
I have
foursuicide files this past year (actually – three – one was successful, one close, 2 watches). Cancers are popping up in the older female workforce.How about equal disability for weaknesses and lies of equal value.
Women and men are different creatures, so we must accept that there are differences and employ men and women according to their frailties. The old Social idea of equality is looking more stupid with each passing generation of fools who flog it.
If it is a legit claim, yes, If not then one would be a douche-bag for pretending and taking it … or may even be as low and devoid of morality as a liberal.
Yah, skip and ofaycat make some reasonable points. Also women tend to be emotional creatures that are used to being taken care of, and those factors also play into the scenario.
Skip, you will find that regardless as to how strict the lottery entry is, there are always over riding factors, if not properly accommodated Sun can and would lose their account, it’s called unionization. If that devil is not placated they would put in their contract negotiations that this be accommodated, seen this happen before.
All I gotta say is MEN DIE from stress related causes, women not so much…..
Many Government workers do not follow Canada’s Low-Risk Alcohol Drinking Guidelines. If more people followed the guidelines to the letter, and maintained a position near the top of the accepted consumption level, there would be fewer mental health problems for everyone.
http://www.camh.ca/en/hospital/health_information/a_z_mental_health_and_addiction_information/alcohol/Pages/low_risk_drinking_guidelines.aspx
…Don’t worry, be happy…
I apologize up front for cutting and pasting but this is my comment to the National Post story yesterday.
I’ll tell you why there are so many women on leave and this is from personal experience. I once looked after a work force of 100 staff of which 40 were women. I had women tell me to my face that if they didn’t get the holidays they wanted or the work assignment etc. etc. they wanted they would go on stress leave, and they did, over and over. These women have doctors who will give them the notes the company requires and most companies will not challenge a doctor. Even our company doctor rarely if ever challenged another doctor. This wasn’t just a couple of them either and this wasn’t a crappy company. It was a government job with all the benefits in the world. I never, ever, had a male employee say that to me. This is what needs to be addressed and many people know it but, oh my, are we going to challenge a sensitive defenseless woman.
This is changing. While some doctors will still issue notes for “stress leave”, increasingly, they had better be able to show the medical basis for it. In the Fed Govt (serpents under Treasury Board/Sun Life, which is most of the departmental serpents), there is no such thing as “stress leave” (or, in other words, it’s called “vacation”). If you are going on “disability” for stress (Sun Life), Sun Life will require your doctor to medically confirm you have a medical syndrome consistent with a diagnosis of stress mediated illness. If he can’t, they’ll deny the claim or require you to be seen by their physicians.
Fed employees taking “stress leave”, and not on disability, are using their sick leave accrual. Most department heads will require a doctor’s certification if more than a few days. If the department doesn’t believe your doctor, you can be referred to the department’s own third party medical agent for concurrence. If the third party referral doesn’t concur, your sick leave will be denied, and you could be subject to AWOL.
Fed employees have an accrual sick leave plan (credits carried over) because the Sun Life long term disability plan doesn’t kick in until you’ve been sick for at least 3 months (13 weeks). Good (or lucky) employees bank their sick leave in order to have the coverage if they get really sick, otherwise they go on EI medical benefit until they are eligible for Sun Life. There is no cash out for accrued sick leave if they leave or retire.
It wouldn’t surprise me to find out, that for women, there are a higher percentage of women looking for stress leave because, in part, they are carrying more of the family burden for elder care, sick kids, than their spouses (as well as the household duties), besides the fact that the workforce is aging. I have female staff caring for sick husbands, parents, kids, as well as being the breadwinner. Not all can keep up.
Wafer…No apology necessary.
I fully believe what you have written. It has been my experience as well although on a drastically reduced scale…yet it is in fact the women who when presented with the ability to utilize “short/long term disability” will do so given the chance.
As for myself: I can only recall being off work for any length of time once…Back in 2006 I got myself a REAL Flu..was knocked down for 4 solid days. That was it, have not missed a single day since…and I have had STD/LTD since 1998.
Mind you, this is the Federal Govt we are talking about…and I must note that the massive majority of persons employed there are Quebecers..???
hmmm, Just like their students who feel $1100 tuitioin for a year of University is asking WAAAAy too much…
If the stress among female civil servants is caused by boredom, incompetence, and being a
total dick as far as serving the public is concerned, it could be a very widespread problem.
My limited observations over the years indicates to me that those women under the most stress
are young, attractive, and intelligent. Their nemeses tend to be older, unintelligent, and going
only by facial structure/appearance possessing more than their fair share of Persian cat DNA.
Skip, something doesn’t jive between your comments and t the article. I still say that women in the workplace, especially the gov’t. workpalces are players of the system. Part of the reason for stress may be created by too high a concentration of women which leads to back biting and politicking. Even so, they will play the situation to their financial gain rather than find a new job as a guy would do. Seen it again and again.
Skip, I hoope you weren’t suggesting the situation is legitimate.
By the way, I have been sitting a table away from a government employee who is on the job , but on break, for the last half hour. I’m leaving; self-employed. He shows no sign of desire to move. they all know there is no accountability.
“they all know there is no accountability.”
There it is. Nicely put.
Years ago, I had friend who was a manager at United Parcel Service. Because of lawsuits, or the threat of lawsuits (I don’t remember which), the company was forced to hire more women to work on the docks and as parcel sorters, which was very heavy, repetitious work. Without exception, every woman they hired went out on permanent disability after a year or two. There may have been a few female power lifters who could do that job, but the average female body could not take the day-long bending, stooping and heavy lifting. To be fair, some of the guys blew up, too, but they usually lasted longer. It was a horrible drain on the company, and bad for the women, too. I think they’re more automated now, so there may be less harm done.
What I described above pertains only to the UPS facility where my friend worked, at a certain period of time. I have no information about other UPS facilities.
As I said – pay little attention to an article in a Canadian paper about how the govt operates. It’s rarely correct.
That said, one has to realise that the govt is huge (like it or not) – different departmental cultures exist, just like they do in any big company. Some employees are players, in every organization – many self-employed are players to – just on different fields. I can’t, and won’t, defend all civil servants – there are good ones, mediocre ones and bad ones, just like any large organization. What government lacks, on balance, is competent management. There are thousands of great employees, but there are comparatively few good managers. Many of the issues you see interacting with civil servants are management failures more than anything. Human nature being what it is, sdtaff will take advantage of the weaknesses – govt or private.
That said again, I’ve looked after staff health and welfare in the (Fed) workplace for 10 years (in addition to my assigned work), and I’ve never had a period like the last 18 months, with wear and tear on staff, nor have I ever been so busy, with such difficult cases, as this past year. Getting a call on the way to work in the morning from the distraught spouse of an employee informing me that our employee attempted suicide the night before makes for a tough day. I’ve had four of those kinds of concerns this year…
The Conservatives are straining budgets, but they are not effective managers (the Liberals are worse) and the staff are in constant turmoil as to what job they are supposed to be doing each day – priorities keep changing, faster than the staff can adapt their output. Our people are professionals – they strive to do good work, but its difficult when the rules and priorities keep changing. There is very little “gender” politics – the stress is from constantly having to “re-work your work” because the govt’s priorities change so rapidly. Believe it or not, there is more political correctness in the Conservative workplace than there ever was with the Liberals. I think part of the difference in the stats is that women “cry uncle” sooner – the men try to tough it out longer.
This behaviour describes perfectly one difference between men and women. Women feel they have the right to abuse for the sake of money, men just like to abuse.
Frank Q @ 10:35 – Just like being a parent; you are not allowed to be sick when your baby needs care.
Further to the minimum 13 week waiting period before one can go on long term disability, a minimum is exactly what it is. If someone has had the good luck not to be sick and has accumulated for example, 52 weeks of sick leave, all 52 weeks have to be used up before going on LTD. Once off of LTD, a person goes back to work with zero hours of sick leave and has to start accumulating again.