WORKED TO DEATH

There is an old saw that claims "hard work never killed anybody", like most old saws it is absolute nonsense, as the following illustrates.
"A Toyota Motor Corp employee died of overwork after logging more than 106 hours of overtime in a month, a judge ruled Friday, reversing a ministry's earlier decision not to pay compensation to his widow. ...The employee, who was working at a Toyota factory in central Japan, died of irregular heartbeat in February 2002 after passing out in the factory around 4 a.m. "(The employee) worked for extremely long hours and the relationship between his work and death is strong," Yomiuri Online quoted Judge Toshiro Tamiya as saying. Overworking is a serious issue in Japan, where an average worker uses less than 50 percent of paid holidays, according to government data. In fiscal year 2005-2006, the labour ministry received 315 requests for compensation from the bereaved families of workers who died of strokes and other illnesses seen as work-related." (Yahoo News, 30 November)
This brings to mind another old saying - "Socialism won't work because the workers are too lazy"! RD