Is Trump’s OSHA ignoring the dead?

Bill Knight column for Thurs., Fri., or Sat., March 15, 16 or 17, 2018

Workers Memorial Day is more than a month away, but the April 30 event held annually will occur at a time when remembering the fallen from work-related injuries or illnesses is made more difficult by the Trump administration.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) dropped fatality information that used to appear on its website as a list of U.S. workers who died on the job, and the agency is “hiding” a severely edited version of the data.

OSHA removed an up-front list of workplace fatalities from its home page, and moved some of it onto a data page –  without names of workers killed, and only for deaths where citations were issued.

During the Obama administration, OSHA published a comprehensive list of worker fatalities and related data. In August, shortly after President Trump installed Loren Sweatt in a political appointment to Deputy Assistant Secretary, OSHA started cutting back worker fatality information formerly published automatically.

The theory had been that employers would more likely comply with safety standards if they feared bad publicity from accidental deaths at their facilities. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce argued that such disclosures were unfair and requested the cutback in transparency.

“They saw this as a way to scare employers straight,” said Marc Freedman, director of labor law policy for the Chamber of Commerce.

Others might concede the approach might have been ineffective – if employers had no shame.

Dr. David Michaels, President Obama’s Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA from 2009-2017, has tried to stand up for the agency amid attacks by Congressional Republicans seeking “voluntary” compliance with job safety and health standards.

Capitol Hill’s ruling GOP prefers a voluntary program letting employers get safety advice without being required to follow it. In exchange, employers virtually escape inspections – as infrequent as those are.

Michaels, now a professor of public health at George Washington University, said that OSHA is underfunded and understaffed. The agency’s budget has remained flat, at $550 million yearly, for almost a decade and its workforce has shrunk, he said, and chronic budget woes trimmed the ranks of OSHA job-site inspectors down to about 2,200 – or approximately 1 compliance officer for every 59,000 American workers.

That means that the typical U.S. workplace would see an OSHA inspector once every 159 years.

 “It is not hyperbole to use the word ‘carnage’ to describe the hazardous conditions in the workplace before OSHA,” Michaels said.

In 1970, 14,000 workers were killed on the job, or 18 per 100,000, he noted. Last year it was 5,190, or 3.6 per 100,000, not counting those who die later from occupationally caused diseases, such as black lung, asbestosis and various cancers.

Also, under the Trump regime, OSHA only lists fatalities in states where OSHA oversees workplace safety (about half of the states do this for themselves).

Meanwhile, according to Sam Pizzigati, a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies, “In 2016, the latest year with full stats, 991 construction workers nationwide died from fatal work injuries, a 3 percent increase over the year before.”

Despite concerns those numbers raise, a complete picture is difficult with less information routinely available. For example, OSHA under Trump also drastically reduced announcements and news releases noting OSHA enforcement actions.

Meanwhile, Trump nominated Scott Mugno, an executive with FedEx, to be Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, but as of press time, the full Senate had not confirmed the appointment, so Sweatt is also acting OSHA chief. The nomination continues the parade of insiders and walking conflicts of interest Trump has named to administration posts – when he nominates anyone. As with many other positions in Trump’s administration, OSHA’s chief of staff and senior adviser jobs remain vacant.