Occupational Safety and Health Administration

Occupational Safety and Health Administration

The agency that promulgates and enforces workplace safety and health standards.

Commentary

safety first

Report: Bush’s Voluntary Program Didn’t Help Job Safety and Health

June 19, 2009

Cry Wolf Quotes

If implemented, they would require employers to establish burdensome and costly new systems intended to track, prevent and provide compensation for an extremely broad class of injuries whose cause is subject to considerable dispute.

-
The Bush Administration, The Los Angeles Times, “Senate Overturns Ergonomics Rules on Worker Safety”.

One month [after the law took effect] a special edition of the Federal Register was published containing close to 250 pages of safety and health standards. Businessmen were given three months to familiarize themselves with these standards before the majority of them were to be effective.

-
Richard B. Berman, Chamber of Commerce, Testimony, the Select Subcommittee on Labor of the House Committee on Education and Labor.

Nobody has proven cotton dust is a source of disease….In forty years, we’ve not had one single employee…disabled because of a respiratory problem.

-
William Pitts owner of the 80 year old Hermitage Mills, located in Camden South Carolina.

Everyone is affected by its [OSHA’s] pervasive coverage, orientation toward imposing penalties and its incredibly complex regulations and standards.…However, OSHA standards are complex and often require expert interpretation. For smaller businesses, the cost of deciphering which regulations apply to them and then determining if they conform can be excessive.

-
Chamber of Commerce newsletter, June, 1973.

Backgrounders & Briefs

2011 Death on the Job

The AFL-CIO's annual report about death, illness, and injury at work.

Gauging Control Technology and Regulatory Impacts in Occupational Safety and Health

Information on multiple OSHA regulations and their costs. In almost every case, the regulations were far cheaper than the agency estimated.