A newsletter of workplace safety and labor issues
Save Harwood, Save Workers: The Trump Administration’s plan to scrap the Susan Harwood Worker Training Grant program has been getting a bit more negative attention. Some of the attention has come from Charles Davis at ATTN, mobile media platform for the young(er) folk. His piece, ‘Workers Are Going to Die’: The Overlooked Budget Cut That Could…
The New York Times takes another look at Obama administration worker protections that are being “revisited” in the early months of the Trump administration. Most of these stories — the Administration’s attempt to roll back the Beryllium rule’s coverage of construction and maritime industries, the delay in enforcement of the silica standard and proposed elimination…
Do Not Pass go: The New York Times reports that “the owner of two Brooklyn construction companies was charged with manslaughter on Wednesday because the authorities said he ignored complaints about a poorly maintained retaining wall that collapsed at a work site in 2015, killing an 18-year-old laborer and injuring two others.” Small Farms Don’t…
More Budget Follies – CDC Edition: We’ve discussed Trump’s FY 18 budget proposal. OSHA and MSHA don’t come out too badly (except for the Susan Harwood Training Grant Program.) NIOSH and the Chemical Safety Board, on the other hand, not so well. Somewhat overlooked in terms of worker (and public safety) is the Centers for…
The budget is not just a collection of numbers, but an expression of our values and aspirations. — Jacob Lew We previewed the budget late last week and that preview was pretty accurate. OSHA’s budget is essentially the same as the recently passed FY 2017 budget — flat except for the proposed elimination of the…
“Don’t tell me what you value, show me your budget, and I’ll tell you what you value.” ― Joe Biden If a President or Congress want to dismantle worker protections or other government programs, they don’t have to repeal or change legislation; they can work their damage through the budget process. Slashthe budget of a…
The Chamber of Commerce is nothing if it’s not consistent. Consistently opposed to each and every new protection issued or contemplated by OSHA, consistently challenging every new OSHA initiative in court, consistently (and drastically) overestimating the cost of every proposed OSHA standard, consistently opposed to any action by OSHA that would expand (or even maintain) workers’…
Raw Sewage and A Foot per Worker: The Labor Department filed a lawsuit against G Farms in El Mirage, Arizona for housing immigrant workers in “dangerous and unsanitary conditions and paying them illegally low wages,” the LA Times reports. Workers had been living in four yellow school buses and two trailers without windows, where they…
Today is Workers Memorial Day, a day set aside around the world to remember those killed on the job — and commit ourselves to fighting to protect workers from preventable death injury and illness on the job. As the AFL-CIO summed up in its Death on the Job report, 4,836 workers were killed on the job…
Earlier this week I reviewed a New York Times article on conflicts of interest among Trump political appointees that highlighted a new Labor Department Special Assistant, Geoffrey Burr. Burr is a former lobbyist for the Associated Builders and Contractors, and his federal disclosure form notes that he lobbied DOL against the silica standard and the Fair…