Minder Veilige het Werk van de Beleidsvorming van het Beleid van Bush
Door Leo W. Gerard | In het hart van Pennsylvania, terwijl de media nog relentlessly Senatoren Obama en Clinton over vlagspelden teisterden en het geheugen vlak vóór primair, een machine bij een installatie ArcelorMital in Steelton verpletterde Roger H. verstrijkt. Prichard aan dood. Hij was 58.
Het was 18 April, drie dagen vóór primair Pennsylvania. Het kwam enkel vijf dagen na het door buizen leiden verpletterde Jaren T. voor. Hoover aan dood bij de dura-Band fabriek van de Pijp, ook in Steelton. Hij was 19.
Het leven ging. Vader van Jaren, een gemeenschappelijke de pleidooienrechter van Pennsylvania, vond dozens die vrienden van zijn zoon bij de begrafenis, en welke jonge geitjes rouwen doen nu, die postgedenktekens op MySpace is. Vrouw van Roger Prichard's vertelde een lokale verslaggever dat haar echtgenoot een goede vader en echtgenoot en het houden van persoon was, alvorens zij ook werd overwonnen blijven sprekend. Zijn kleinkinderen zullen nooit worden om hem te kennen.
Aangezien de presidentiële kandidaten herhaaldelijk om zich op onbelangrijk worden gedwongen te concentreren - of Hillary het schreeuwen vervalste of te luid of of Obama lachte die eens op een raad van beheer met een smakeloos karakter wordt gediend - de echte kwesties zoals federale handhaving van werkplaatsveiligheid worden volledig genegeerd.
De maandag, 28 April, echter, is één dagterzijde leggen om zich het leven op van besparingsarbeiders' te concentreren. Het is de HerdenkingsDag van Arbeiders. Het is een gelegenheid waarbij wij de doden rouwen en voor betere voorwaarden voor het leven streven.
Onder het Beleid van Bush, is dit niets dan een strijd geweest.
Hier is een het vertellen statistiek: het aantal werkplaatssterfgevallen steeg vanaf 2005 tot 2006, het laatste volledige jaar waarvoor de cijfers beschikbaar zijn. Door 106. Het totaal voor 2005 was 5.734 dood in de V.S. Volgend jaar, nam het tot 5.840 toe.
Tijdens de zes jaar van het beleid van Bush waarvoor er statistieken zijn, nam het aantal sterfgevallen vier keer toe. De sterfgevallen beklommen zo hoog vanaf 2003 tot 2004 die het tarief eigenlijk verhoogde, de eerste keer die - tijdens of een Republikeins of Democratisch beleid - sinds 1970 is voorgekomen toen het Congres de handeling overging die tot de Dienst voor arbeidsveiligheid en -hygiëne (OSHA) leidt om werkplaatsveiligheid te verbeteren.
Elke dag in 2006, stierven 16 arbeiders op de baan. This was not from heart attacks or strokes. This was from traumatic workplace injuries — because they suffocated when pits they were digging collapsed with sides not properly shored up, or because they plummeted from construction sites lacking safety gear to stop the fall, or because dust that should not have been accumulating in the factory air exploded.
Workplace safety has the same problem as car safety. No one much pays attention to individuals like Jaren T. Hoover and Roger H. Prichard, just like they don’t pay much attention to single car accidents killing a person here and there on the highway. The public does notice, however, when a plane crashes or when a crane topples over in Manhattan, killing six construction workers all at once, or when a disaster in a mine in West Virginia suffocates 12 Sago workers.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of deaths occur one-by-one, and so, in the resulting lack of public outrage and uproar afterward, the Bush Administration has, over the past seven years, managed to de-fund OSHA, the agency responsible for keeping workers safe and dismantle its regulation structure.
Since George W. Bush took office and decided that a policy of government and business cooperating like good ‘ole boys to enforce rules should replace the former inspection structure, OSHA’s budget has been cut by $25 million and its staff by nearly 200 positions.
A report by the AFL-CIO Safety and Health Office, called, “Death on the Job, The Toll of Neglect” calculates that with OSHA’s current number of inspectors, it would take the agency 133 years to examine each workplace under its jurisdiction just once. So don’t expect OSHA to show up to check your employer real soon, no matter how bad things are.
The report puts the situation this way: “When it comes to job safety enforcement and coverage, it is clear that OSHA lacks sufficient resources to protect workers adequately.”
Well, surely then, when something happens, like a workplace crushing death, OSHA responds by smacking down the recalcitrant employer with a big fine to get them in line, right? Wrong.
In 2007, serious violations of the act — an infraction is deemed serious if it poses a substantial probability of death or major physical harm — carried an average fine of $909.
For a fatality, the average penalty was $10,133. And that number is unusually high. In the previous four years, the fines averaged $6,100. The AFL-CIO report authors expect the 2007 number to shrink after companies successfully appeal larger fines levied against them.
Barring good use of inspections and fines, there’s another enforcement tool that could keep workers safe. That would be criminally prosecuting employers whose engage in egregious behavior, like removing or disabling safety devices on dangerous equipment.
In Canada, workers will toll a bell during their Workers Memorial Day commemorations for Steve L’Ecuyer, a 23-year-old crushed to death by a machine after his employer, Transpave, Inc. deliberately disabled a safety device intended to prevent such an accident. There, Transpave was found criminally negligent and fined $110,000.
Here, the Department of Labor referred ten cases to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution in 2007. The number is limited because the kinds of cases are restricted under current U.S. law. They may only be instances in which Labor found that an employer’s willful violation of regulation resulted in a worker’s death or where false statements were made. If there’s a conviction, the penalties are also limited — a maximum of six months in jail.
Even so, the Justice Department has taken action on none of the referred cases.
Not one.
No wonder 106 more people failed to come home from work in 2006 than in 2005.
Work is less safe. Monday is the day to protest that. It is the day to demand safety in the names of Roger H. Prichard and Jaren T. Hoover and all of the others who did not come home.
See More:Bush Law USA NewsHave Your Say: Bush Administration Policies Making Work Less Safe
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This entry was posted on Monday, April 28th, 2008 at 4:03 am and is filed under Business News, Opinion, Political News . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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