According to the most recent numbers, absenteeism rates in Canada have been rising over the past 10 years, jumping from roughly seven days lost per worker annually to more than 10 currently.

And much of this has to do with demographics, according to a recent study from the C.D. Howe Institute.

As the demographic weight of the population shifts from younger to older categories, reported sick days rise significantly, the report claims. For example, men ages 45 to 54 report an average of 1.3 more days lost due to illness than do males 35 to 44.

Age is not the only factor keeping people off the job, of course.

Over the past 25 years, the average number of days lost per year due to illness has remained largely unchanged among men but increased sharply among women. 

That's not that surprising when you consider that women are usually the principal caregiver for children and may take time off “sick” to look after them. As well, a higher proportion of women than men work part-time, skewing the numbers accordingly.

If you're lucky to have a decent benefit plan at work, you probably value your health coverage. But are you getting everything you can out of the plan you have?

Corporate health plans increasingly have features that are tied to a 12-month cycle, including annual deductibles, preventive checkups and, in some instance, health-spending accounts.

Employees who don't pay attention to the calendar risk wasting fully covered benefits and paying more than they have to for procedures delayed until the following year.

For example, a dental plan may limit expenses in a calendar year while a vision plan bases its cap on a moving 24-month window.

If your plan benefits do roll over in January, one thing you might want to check is that you aren't missing out on important counselling services or potential stress-relieving perks like massage treatments or physiotherapy. 

A backlash is brewing against the unpaid internship with many issues against this type of employment coming to light.

It's been recently discovered that if you're an unpaid intern in Ontario, you aren't protected by health and safety laws, according to the Toronto Star. While the provincial government is currently reviewing and reconsidering the law, there's no timeline on when any changes could be made.

This adds to a growing discontent expressed about unpaid internships. In Vancouver, there was a backlash against the Fairmont Waterfront hotel for offering an unpaid internship to bus tables. Another recent Toronto Star story showed that hospitality interns did the job of a cleaning lady during their internship. While two former Bell interns filed a complaint with allegations that the company broke labour laws when they weren't paid for the work they did.

Many young workers taken on unpaid internships with the number of them in Canada ranging from 100,000 to 300,000, according to the CBC. Young people have a tougher time landing a job, especially after the recession, and it's no wonder that they're trying any possible way to gain experience to jumpstart their careers.

Ninety-three per cent of Canadian women business leaders feel they're paid less than their male counterparts and that image has more to do with their possible advancement compared to men, according to a new Randstad Canada survey.

Despite any recent gains, more than three quarters (77 per cent) believe women still need to work harder and put in longer hours than men to prove themselves, particularly in management and executive roles.

And while there's always lots of talk about family-friendly workplaces, 49 per cent feel that employers are increasingly leery of family-related absences among women employees and this has a significant impact on their advancement.

Today's retirement challenge? Too much life, not enough savings.

So much so, that nearly one in five Canadian workers (17%) are fairly sure they'll never be able to afford to retire fully, according to study released by global bank HSBC.

Among the 15 countries surveyed, Canada had one of the largest proportions of workers who feel this way, followed closely by the United Kingdom (19%) and United States (18%).

Of those who are divorced or separated, the number jumps to 24% -- another indicator that so-called grey divorces, where a growing number of people are ending their marriages in their later years -- continue to crimp retirement plans.

Late-in-life divorce means that there's much less time to rebuild retirement assets and the numbers are startling.

The divorce rate among middle-aged and older adults has doubled during the past two decades, and the rate was 2.5 times higher for remarriages than for first marriages, according to figures from the National Center for Family & Marriage.

 Whereas if you were younger, in your 30s or 40s and you’re involved in a divorce and division of assets, there is still some time left to rebuild those assets,” she said.

Despite nagging concerns, Canadians' finances have actually improved in the past year, with fewer people living paycheque to paycheque and more even managing to put some money aside, according to a recent poll by the Canadian Payroll Association.

Every year, sites like Careerbuilder and Workopolis ask hiring managers and HR professionals about the wildest excuses they hear when employees call in sick. And there's no shortage of whoppers, particularly since something like 50 percent of workers admit that they call in sick when they're actually not.

No big deal? Everybody does it, right? Well, the boss is on to you.

One survey found that 29 per cent of employers say they regularly check up on an employee to verify that the illness is legitimate, usually by requiring a doctor’s note or calling the employee later in the day.

In addition, another 18 percent have had co-workers call a suspected faker, and 14 percent have even gone so far as to drive by their home for a closer look.

All in all, some 17 percent of employers say they've actually fired employees for giving a fake excuse about being sick.

And you could be next. That's what happened to an Alberta technician who asked his employer for a day off to play in a baseball tournament despite being told that he couldn't have the time off. 

In the same way many people can't leave work problems at the office, there are those who struggle to park their personal issues at home.

Workers dealing with personal problems often find their minds wandering, and don’t do their best work. And money issues seem to be at the top of that list of stressers.

Forty-four per cent of full-time employees worry about personal finances during work hours, according to research from Purchasing Power, an American provider of supplementary workplace benefits. And that exacts a big toll on both their health and productivity. 

"Stress over money takes both a mental and physical toll on workers, impacting health-related costs and reducing productivity by a significant number," says Richard Carrano, CEO of Purchasing Power. "Employees' financial problems become the employer's problems as well."

According to the Child Care Advocacy Association of Canada (CCAAC), child care fees are typically the second highest cost to families next to housing.

Not only that, over 70 per cent of mothers are in the work force and yet there are only enough child care spaces for about 20 per cent of the families who need them.

Consider a single parent working at a job with minimum wage. The cost of child care far outweighs the income earned.

As Bob Dylan once sang, The times they are a-changin'.

And so are the skill sets that Canadian employers are seeking to fill positions within their companies.

The Conference Board of Canada identified that Ontario alone is losing out on as much as $24.3 billion in economic activity annually because employers can't find suitable candidates with the skills they require to innovate and grow in today's economy.