Who is the most precarious among the nonstandard workers? A comparative study of unmet medical needs among standard workers and subtypes of nonstandard workers

Objective

Nonstandard workers might have a relatively higher risk of unmet medical needs than standard workers. This study subdivided nonstandard workers to investigate the effects of nonstandard employment on unmet medical needs.

Methods

We used the Korea Health Panel 2011–2018 data. The independent variable, employment contract, was defined using the nonstandard form described by the ILO: Temporary workers, Part-time workers, and Temporary agent workers. The analytical method used in this study was a panel logit model that accounted for repeated measured participants. By controlling for time-invariant individual-fixed effects, we investigate the relationship between subdivided nonstandard work and the risk of unmet medical needs with reference to standard work.

Results

The results of the analysis clearly showed that compared with standard workers, temporary agency workers had a significantly higher risk of unmet medical needs (Odds ratio = 1.182, 95% CI = 1.016–1.374). The main cause of this phenomenon was economic reasons in this group.

Conclusions

This study found that temporary agency workers in the general Korean population have a significantly higher risk of unmet healthcare needs. The result of this study implies that financial hardship might be a fundamental health hazard among workers with nonstandard employment.