For many workers, financial stress is not confined to the household budget. It affects how they feel, how they plan for the future and how they perform at work.
The latest TELUS Mental Health Index makes that connection clear. Sixty-four percent of U.S. workers feel worried or anxious about their finances at least some of the time. Eleven percent always feel anxious about money, and this group's Mental Health Index score is 47 points lower than the score of workers who never feel financially anxious.
That matters to employers for many reasons. Fifteen percent of workers say their personal financial situation negatively affected their productivity during the previous three months. Thirty-four percent of workers say financial stress has caused increased anxiety, 23 percent report disrupted sleep, 14 percent report reduced motivation or engagement and 10 percent report difficulty concentrating at work. Three percent say they have missed work because of financial stress.
Beyond the productivity challenges, financial stress can lower morale, hurt a company’s culture, and make it difficult to attract and retain top talent.
These findings reinforce a core belief within TELUS Health Retirement and Benefits Solutions: financial health is foundational health. It is the security and confidence people gain when they can understand, access and use their workplace benefits and retirement programs effectively.
View our snapshot for a quick overview of the data and findings.
Cost-of-living pressure is exposing deeper financial insecurity
Cost of living is the most visible source of financial anxiety. Fifty-eight percent of workers identify it as their leading financial concern.
This anxiety around cost-of-living increases is not unfounded as our data shows that 23 percent of U.S. workers lack enough emergency savings to cover basic needs. Their Mental Health Index score is 53, compared with 75 among workers with emergency savings, a 22-point gap that mirrors the gap between workers whose productivity is affected by financial stress and those whose isn't.
Benefits confusion is as damaging to health as a lack of emergency savings
Workers who understand their retirement and savings programs very well have a Mental Health Index score of 76, while those with no understanding score 54. That's a 22-point spread, which is the same magnitude as the emergency savings gap. Think about that, a lack of understanding of available benefits can be just as damaging to health as not having emergency savings.
This reveals a critical vulnerability, and also a great opportunity. Investing in tools to help members navigate enrollment, evaluate options and understand how a benefit applies during a life event on their own can have positive cascading effects on financial and mental health.
How better benefits and retirement administration can help improve financial health and transform organizations
For employers to be part of the solution and help address financial anxiety, they should begin with what they can control: offering intuitive digital experiences, effective decision-support tools, AI-enabled technology that reduces barriers and reliable human assistance when it’s needed.
At TELUS Health, we help members and organizations overcome the complexity of fragmented systems and multiple vendors with an all-in-one platform that reduces barriers and improves access and understanding of the benefits available to members.
Tools like our AI-powered Ava chatbot work alongside our award-winning call center teams to help members truly understand and utilize what is available to them.
When organizations partner with TELUS Health for tools like Decision Support and programs like Benefits Accounts, they can truly unlock the potential that benefits have in helping transform the financial and mental health of their members.
Employers cannot eliminate inflation, unexpected expenses or every source of financial anxiety. They can make the programs within their control easier to understand and use. And the data suggest this matters more than most employers may realize.
The opportunity is clear: move beyond simply offering benefits toward helping employees understand and use them. The investment is already there. The return, in improved health outcomes, engagement and financial confidence, is waiting to be unlocked.
Retirement & Benefits Solutions
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Learn moreFinancial health is our focus
Financial health is foundational health. TELUS Health exists to build it through benefits and retirement programs that work for organizations and the people who depend on them, across the full hire through retire journey.
