The 17 jobs that are most likely to leave you depressed

They're not what you might expect

We already know the jobs that could be making us ill, but a new study from an American health authority has listed the top 17 jobs that are most likely to leave workers feeling anxious, stressed and depressed.

Now, you might assume that jobs associated with high-stress like banking, law and medicine, or high-stake jobs like politics, would be top of the list but in fact, they don't even make the top five. The jobs that are highest on the list seem to be any that involve doing an act for the public, or ones that require a lot of 'emotional labour.'

Some jobs are just more depression-prone due to stressful, long hours or a lack of control. A lot of these fields feel 24/7 (such as social work) and involve a culture that says to do a good job, you have to work extremely hard. Some of these positions, like driving, and writing, can also lead to depression because of the isolated nature of the job as they usually have uncertain hours and can mean irregular payments.

And, interestingly, it's more common that men are more likely to be associated with major depression and 7% of the workforce on a whole experience depressed episodes due to work every year.

Here are the 17 jobs that are most linked to depression

1. Transportation driver
2. Estate agent
3. Social worker
4. Manufacturer
5. Personal services
6. Legal services
7. Housekeeper
8. Membership organisations
9. Security and commodities brokers
10. Printing and publishing
11. Agricultural services
12. Retail
13. Electric, gas, and sanitary
14. Special trade contractors
15. Petroleum and coal
16. General merchandise retail
17. Auto repair

The highest rate of depression tends to traditionally be found among bus drivers while the lowest rate of depression is found in recreational services which includes the sports industry as well as the performing-arts and fitness industries.

Economically, depression has an affect on general productivity and a study by Europe PMC stated that mental illness costs the economy £66 billion on average every year. Well, that's proof that happy workers are good workers.