Unequal Upsides? The Status-Based Inequalities in the Relationship Between Schedule Control and Job Pressure

Abstract

Abstract Sociologists have long identified job pressure as a central work-related stressor with far-reaching consequences for workers’ well-being, their families, and organizations. However, surprisingly little empirical work examines how schedule control influences job pressure in a longitudinal framework—or the status-based contingencies in the resource functions of schedule control. Drawing on five waves of population-level panel data from the Canadian Work, Stress, and Health Study (2011–2019), I use fixed-effects analyses to examine the relationship between schedule control and job pressure, examining whether schedule control operates differently across occupations (professionals versus non-professionals) and levels of authority in the workplace. My findings help advance the sociological study of work-stress research by resolving competing predictions about the relationship between schedule control and job pressure across status. While others have argued the possibility for schedule control to intensify work-related pressures, I find that schedule control helps reduce job pressure. However, my results reveal that schedule control does not benefit all workers equally: it has unequal upsides for higher status workers. These discoveries sharpen existing knowledge about the resource functions of schedule control and are discussed in light of synthesizing key ideas from the sociology of work, and the stress process and job demands-resources models.