Death on the Job: Up for the First Time in 10 Years

by Mike Hall, Apr 25, 2006

With the number of deaths in the nation’s coal mines in the first four months of this year already exceeding last year’s entire toll, the AFL-CIO’s annual job safety report reveals even more troubling and deadly information about the nation’s workplaces. For the first time in a decade, the national job fatality rate was up from the previous year.

In 2004 (the latest year for which Bureau of Labor Statistics figures are available), 5,703 workers died from workplace injuries, compared to 5,575 the previous year, reports Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect.

The 15th edition of the AFL-CIO’s national and state-by-state profile of worker safety and health in the United States reveals that along with the increased number of workplace deaths in 2004, the rate of on-the-job fatalities (4.1 per 100,000 workers) was up by 2 percent from 2003. The last year the rate went up from the previous year was 1993.

The report’s release comes just before the April 28 worldwide observance of Workers Memorial Day, a day set aside every year to honor workers killed and hurt on the job. In the United States, job safety advocates will focus on the Bush administration’s troubling workplace safety record. (Visit Confined Space for a look at Workers Memorial Day around the world.)

In sum, the AFL-CIO report says:

Very simply, workers need more job safety and health protections. The Bush administration’s lack of regulation and increased attention to employer assistance and voluntary compliance comes at the expense of worker safety and health.

In addition to the overall increase in deaths, Death on the Job reports significant increases in the number of Hispanic and foreign-born workers killed.

For Hispanic workers, worksite deaths increased by 66 percent from 1992 to 2004—at the time when overall workplace deaths were declining. From 2003 to 2004, the number of Hispanic workers killed on the job jumped from 791 to 883.

In 2004, 956 foreign-born workers were killed, compared to 890 in 2003. The 2004 toll was the second highest among foreign workers in 13 years.

Notes the report:

As the economy, the workforce and hazards are changing, we falling further and further behind in our efforts to protect workers from new and existing problems.

While the report notes the overall workplace injury and illness rate dropped slightly from 2003 to 2004, an average of 11,780 workers were hurt on the job every day in 2004.

However, that number could very well be far off the mark. A recent study published in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (subscription required) estimates that government figures underreport the real number of injuries and illnesses by two-thirds.

The Bush administration’s refusal to pursue and enact new job safety standards and its inadequate funding for the nation’s two major safety agencies—the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA)—play a major role in the continuing problem of deadly and dangerous jobs, according to the AFL-CIO report:

Overall, dozens of OSHA and MSHA standards were pulled from the administration’s regulatory agenda, including MSHA standards on mine rescue teams, self-contained, self-rescuer devices and escapes and refuges which may have helped prevent the fatalities at the Sago mine disaster.

Twelve miners died and another was seriously injured following a Jan. 2 methane explosion at the West Virginia mine. They survived several hours after the initial blast but were unable to escape the mine.

In real dollars (adjusted for inflation), federal funding for job safety programs has decreased since fiscal year 2001, when the Bush administration began.

OSHA funding dropped by 3 percent, with state enforcement programs and job-safety standard setting taking the biggest hits, Death on the Job reports. Even more troubling, MSHA’s coal enforcement budget has been cut by 9 percent during the same period.

In a clear indication of the Bush administration’s skewed job safety priorities, officials have cut job-safety enforcement dollars while increasing spending for voluntary employer compliance programs.

In addition, the administration’s fiscal year 2007 budget proposes the complete elimination of funding for OSHA worker safety and health training programs.

The report also breaks down the death and injury rates by industry, state and race; tracks trends in enforcement activities, regulations and funding; and examines other job safety statistics.

Be sure to visit the AFL-CIO’s Workers Memorial Day site to download a copy of Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect and other important material on job safety and Workers Memorial Day.

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