Community perspective
On Labor Day, we honor the contributions working men and women have made throughout history to the strength and prosperity of our nation. There are many, and they deserve the tribute.

But throughout our nation’s history, there have also been too many workplace related deaths and injuries. That’s part of our Labor Day past. My goal is to make sure that workers are safe and healthy today and in the future.

Twelve workers die every day on the job, and another 3.3 million Americans are seriously injured each year. One workplace injury or fatality is one too many.

As a nation, we’ve made significant progress on workplace safety since Congress created the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration more than 40 years ago. OSHA’s good work has brought about historic declines in workplace fatalities, injuries and illnesses.

The American workforce has doubled in size in the last four decades, but workplace deaths are down more than two-thirds. In fact, according to a report issued last week by our Bureau of Labor Statistics, workplace fatalities have decreased by 27 percent since 1992.

As the ongoing debate about measures to spur our economic recovery continues, some pundits have called health and safety regulations “job killers.” They have it backward. The truth is, strong worksite safety rules don’t kill jobs; they ensure that jobs don’t kill workers.

While compliance with workplace safety rules does have costs, the cost of not fixing unsafe or deadly workplaces is far greater—for workers, for their families and for their employers.

Studies of workplace injuries and illnesses estimate the total costs on businesses to range from $149 billion to $181 billion annually. A sobering report released last March found the most disabling injuries — those that keep employees away from work for six days or more — cost U.S. employers more than $53 billion per year.

To put it another way, U.S. businesses spend more than $1 billion every week to compensate working families for sickness, injury and death caused by their jobs.

These are just the quantifiable costs; there are other indirect costs employers pay. When injured workers miss work or return to employment with temporary or permanent work limitations, their contribution to production declines. This also affects the productivity of fellow workers who depend on injured workers’ skills and experience. When injured employees can no longer work, employers incur the extra costs of overtime for other workers, followed by the costs of hiring and training new employees to fill their positions.

The moral argument is clear: Americans who work hard to provide for their families have a right to expect their employer will take steps to protect them from breathing lethal toxins, falling from unsecured construction platforms, losing fingers in factory machinery and dying from heat stroke

The economic argument is equally clear: Workplace safety regulations and vigorous enforcement not only save lives, they save profits and revenues companies can use to reinvest in the American worker.

In Alaska, there were 39 workplace fatalities in 2010, and more than 5,400 serious illnesses and injuries on the job in 2009, according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. These are needless tragedies not only to workers and their families, but also to their employers and our economy.

The right to a safe workplace is non-negotiable. A healthy economy does not demand unhealthy workplaces.

Hilda L. Solis is the U.S. secretary of labor.
Copyright 2011 Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. All rights reserved.

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