The official numbers are that 5,400 people are killed on the job each year and more than 4 million are injured. Some experts say that these statistics are inaccurate and that up to 13 million workers are injured each year. The Democratic Policy Committee website notes that hispanics workers are 12% more likely to be injured than other workers.

These numbers are intolerable.

The Las Vegas Sun published an editorial urging that OSHA be given more resources and that it better enforce safety standards in the workplace.

That question has largely stalled Congress because of the polarized factions in the debate. There has been little common ground between business interests, which have worked against government regulation and enforcement, and union and health advocates, who want to see government take an active role protecting workers.

As a result of the tension, OSHA has become a bureaucratic quagmire, where regulations take a decade or more to make and where priorities consistently shift.

In a recent attempt to strengthen and improve OSHA, Congressional Democrats have introduced the Protecting America’s Workers Act. Among other things, this legislation would increase the penalty to an employer who wilfully violates an OSHA provision resulting in the death of an employee from a paltry $10,000 maximum to a minimum of $50,000 and maximum of $250,000.

While not a satisfactory penalty scale, it is of course preferable to what presently exists. The threat of a $10,000 fine clearly is insufficient to create a deterrent to unsafe work environment.

What is clear, and what the Democrats have implicitly acknowledged by proposing this legislation, is that OSHA needs to be improved. We can only hope that change will be enacted – and that it will be meaningful change – and that it won’t be blocked by a Republican filibuster.

“…There is a profound irony in what you are asking from me… it hinges on the truth that when a man sees evil and does nothing, he becomes a part of it…”

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