Occupational Safety and Health Administration
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA; /ˈoʊʃə/) is a regulatory agency of the United States Department of Labor that originally had federal visitorial powers to inspect and examine workplaces.[2]: 12, 16 The United States Congress established the agency under the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act), which President Richard M. Nixon signed into law on December 29, 1970. OSHA's mission is to "assure safe and healthy working conditions for working men and women by setting and enforcing standards and by providing training, outreach, education, and assistance."[3] The agency is also charged with enforcing a variety of whistleblower statutes and regulations. OSHA's workplace safety inspections have been shown to reduce injury rates and injury costs without adverse effects on employment, sales, credit ratings, or firm survival.[4]
"OSHA" redirects here. For other uses, see OSHA (disambiguation).Agency overview
- 1934 (as Bureau of Labor Standards)
- April 28, 1971
2,265 (2015)[1]
$591,787,000 (2021)
- Douglas L. Parker, Assistant Secretary
History[edit]
The Bureau of Labor Standards of the Department of Labor has worked on some work safety issues since its creation in 1934.[5] Economic boom and associated labor turnover during World War II worsened work safety in nearly all areas of the United States economy, but after 1945 accidents again declined as long-term forces reasserted themselves.[6] Additionally, new and powerful labor unions played an increasingly important role in worker safety post-World War II. In the 1960s, increasing economic expansion again led to rising injury rates, and the resulting political pressures led Congress to establish[6] the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) on April 28, 1971, the date that the Occupational Health and Safety Act became effective.[7] The new agency incorporated much of what had been the original Bureau of Labor Standards. George Guenther was appointed by Labor Secretary James D. Hodgson as the agency's first director.
OSHA has run a number of training, compliance assistance, and health and safety recognition programs throughout its history. The OSHA Training Institute, which trains government and private sector health and safety personnel, began in 1972.[7] In 1978, the agency began a grant-making program, now called the Susan Harwood Training Grant Program, to train workers and employers in reducing workplace hazards.[7] OSHA started the Voluntary Protection Programs in 1982, which allow employers to apply as "model workplaces" to achieve special designation if they meet certain requirements.[7]
Employers have the responsibility to provide a safe workplace.[11]
By law, employers must provide their workers with a workplace that does not have serious hazards, and they must follow all OSH Act safety and health standards. Employers are obligated to identify and rectify safety and health problems. The OSH Act further requires that employers must first attempt to eliminate or reduce hazards by making feasible changes in working conditions, rather than relying solely on personal protective equipment such as masks, gloves, or earplugs. Examples of effective ways to eliminate or reduce risks include switching to safer chemicals, enclosing processes to trap harmful fumes, or using ventilation systems to clean the air.
Employers must also:
Workers have the right to:[19]
Temporary workers must be treated like permanent employees. Staffing agencies and host employers share joint accountability for temporary workers. Both entities are therefore obligated to comply with workplace health and safety requirements and ensure worker safety and health. OSHA could hold both the host and temporary employers responsible for any violations.[21]
The Occupational Safety and Health Act grants OSHA the authority to issue workplace health and safety regulations.[22] These regulations include limits on hazardous chemical exposure, employee access to hazard information, requirements for the use of personal protective equipment, and requirements to prevent falls and hazards from operating dangerous equipment.
The OSH Act's current Construction, General Industry, Maritime, and Agriculture standards[23] are designed to protect workers from a wide range of serious hazards. Examples of OSHA standards include requirements for employers to provide fall protection such as a safety harness/line or guardrails; prevent trenching cave-ins; prevent exposure to some infectious diseases; ensure the safety of workers who enter confined spaces; prevent exposure to harmful chemicals; put guards on dangerous machines; provide respirators or other safety equipment, and provide training for certain dangerous jobs in a language and vocabulary workers can understand.
OSHA sets enforceable permissible exposure limits (PELs) to protect workers against the health effects of exposure to hazardous substances, including limits on the airborne concentrations of hazardous chemicals in the air.[24] Most of OSHA’s PELs were issued shortly after the adoption of the OSH Act in 1970. Attempts to issue more stringent PELs have been blocked by litigation from the industry; thus, the vast majority of PELs have not been updated since 1971.[25] The agency has issued non-binding, alternate occupational exposure limits that may better protect workers.[26][27]
Employers must also comply with the General Duty Clause of the OSH Act. This clause requires employers to keep their workplaces free of serious recognized hazards and is generally cited when no specific OSHA standard applies to the hazard.
In its first year of operation, OSHA was permitted to adopt regulations based on guidelines set by certain standards organizations, such as the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists, without going through all of the requirements of a typical rule-making.
OSHA is granted the authority to promulgate standards that prescribe the methods employers are legally required to follow to protect their workers from hazards. Before OSHA can issue a standard, it must go through a very extensive and lengthy process that includes substantial public engagement, notice, and comment. The agency must show that a significant risk to workers exists and that there are feasible measures employers can take to protect their workers.
In 2000, OSHA issued an ergonomics standard. In March 2001, Congress voted to repeal the standard through the Congressional Review Act. The repeal, one of the first major pieces of legislation signed by President George W. Bush, is the first instance that Congress has successfully used the Congressional Review Act to block regulation.
Since 2001, OSHA has issued the following standards:
Enforcement[edit]
OSHA is responsible for enforcing its standards on regulated entities. Compliance Safety and Health Officers carry out inspections and assess fines for regulatory violations. Inspections are planned for worksites in particularly hazardous industries. Inspections can also be triggered by a workplace fatality, multiple hospitalizations, worker complaints, or referrals.
OSHA is a small agency, given the size of its mission: with its state partners, OSHA has approximately 2,400 inspectors covering more than 8 million workplaces where 130 million workers are employed. In Fiscal Year 2012 (ending Sept. 30), OSHA and its state partners conducted more than 83,000 inspections of workplaces across the United States — just a fraction of the nation’s worksites.[31] According to a report by AFL–CIO, it would take OSHA 129 years to inspect all workplaces under its jurisdiction.[32]
Enforcement plays an important part in OSHA's efforts to reduce workplace injuries, illnesses, and fatalities. Inspections are initiated without advance notice, conducted using on-site or telephone and facsimile investigations, performed by trained compliance officers and scheduled based on the following priorities [highest to lowest]: imminent danger; catastrophes – fatalities or hospitalizations; worker complaints and referrals; targeted inspections – particular hazards, high injury rates; and follow-up inspections.
Current workers or their representatives may file a complaint and ask OSHA to inspect their workplace if they believe that there is a serious hazard or that their employer is not following OSHA standards. Workers and their representatives have the right to ask for an inspection without OSHA telling their employer who filed the complaint. It is a violation of the OSH Act for an employer to fire, demote, transfer or in any way discriminate against a worker for filing a complaint or using other OSHA rights.
When an inspector finds violations of OSHA standards or serious hazards, OSHA may issue citations and fines. A citation includes methods an employer may use to fix a problem and the date by which the corrective actions must be completed.
OSHA’s fines are very low compared with other government agencies. They were raised for the first time since 1990 on August 2, 2016, to comply with the 2015 Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act Improvements Act passed by Congress to advance the effectiveness of civil monetary penalties and to maintain their deterrent effect. The new law directs agencies to adjust their penalties for inflation each year. The maximum OSHA fine for a serious violation is $13,653 (which can be assessed daily after a failure to "abate" the violation) and the maximum fine for a repeat or willful violation is $136,532.[33] In determining the amount of the proposed penalty, OSHA must take into account the gravity of the alleged violation and the employer’s size of business, good faith, and history of previous violations.[34] Employers have the right to contest any part of the citation, including whether a violation actually exists.[35] Workers only have the right to challenge the deadline by which a problem must be resolved. Appeals of citations are heard by the independent Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC).
In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic caused about 1,300 workers and their families to contract the virus, with four deaths, at the Smithfield Foods packing plant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The governor, Kristi Noem, resisted initiating and enforcing measures to protect workers and the community.[36][37][38] The plant was fined $13,494 – the maximum allowed at the time – by OSHA for what was considered a single violation.[36]
OSHA carries out its enforcement activities through its 10 regional offices and 90 area offices.[31] OSHA’s regional offices are located in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Kansas City, Denver, San Francisco, and Seattle.
Record keeping requirements[edit]
Tracking and investigating workplace injuries and illnesses play an important role in preventing future injuries and illnesses. Under OSHA’s Recordkeeping regulation, certain covered employers in high-hazard industries are required to prepare and maintain records of serious occupational injuries and illnesses. This information is important for employers, workers, and OSHA in evaluating the safety of a workplace, understanding industry hazards, and implementing worker protections to reduce and eliminate hazards.
Employers with more than ten employees and whose establishments are not classified as a partially exempt industry must record serious work-related injuries and illnesses using OSHA Forms 300, 300A and 301. Recordkeeping forms, requirements, and exemption information are on OSHA’s website.[39]
Whistleblower Protection Program[edit]
OSHA’s Whistleblower Protection Program (WPP) enforces the whistleblower provisions of the Occupational Safety and Health Act and 24 other statutes protecting workers who report violations of various airline, commercial motor carrier, consumer product, environmental, financial reform, food safety, health care reform, nuclear, pipeline, public transportation agency, maritime and securities laws.[18] Unlike OSHA’s Safety Enforcement complaints (or referrals) being completely anonymous, OSHA’s whistleblower investigations can not be anonymous as a Respondent is required to address all allegations of adverse actions taken against Complainant’s employment. Additionally, these whistleblower investigations follow the McDonnell-Douglas burden shifting framework. WPP’s Investigators conduct complex investigations pertaining to complaints of retaliation by an employer (Respondent) against an employee (Complainant) who reported a violation(s) covered under one of the 25 statutes.
WPP Investigators act as neutral fact-finders; they do not work for either the Complainant or Respondent.[40] A WPP Investigator’s job is to impartially gather and analyze all relevant evidence to determine whether unlawful whistleblower retaliation has occurred.[18] Over the years, OSHA’s WPP has been responsible for enforcing these laws that protect the rights of workers to speak up without fear of retaliation, regardless of the relationship of these laws to occupational safety and health matters.[18]
Efficacy[edit]
A 2012 study in Science found that OSHA's random workplace safety inspections caused a "9.4% decline in injury rates" and a "26% reduction in injury cost" for the inspected firms.[4] The study found "no evidence that these improvements came at the expense of employment, sales, credit ratings, or firm survival."[4] A 2020 study in the American Economic Review found that the decision by the Obama administration to issue press releases that named and shamed facilities that violated OSHA safety and health regulations led other facilities to increase their compliance and to experience fewer workplace injuries. The study estimated that each press release had the same effect on compliance as 210 inspections.[45][46]
Much of the debate about OSHA regulations and enforcement policies revolve around the cost of regulations and enforcement, versus the actual benefit in reduced worker injury, illness, and death. A 1995 study of several OSHA standards by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) found that OSHA relies "generally on methods that provide a credible basis for the determinations essential to rulemaking." Though it found that OSHA's findings and estimates are "subject to vigorous review and challenge", it stated that this is natural because "interested parties and experts involved in rulemakings have differing visions."[47]
OSHA has come under considerable criticism for the ineffectiveness of its penalties, particularly its criminal penalties. The maximum penalty is a misdemeanor with a maximum of 6 months in jail.[48] In response to the criticism, OSHA, in conjunction with the Department of Justice, has pursued several high-profile criminal prosecutions for violations under the Act and has announced a joint enforcement initiative between OSHA and the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) which has the ability to issue much higher fines than OSHA. Meanwhile, Congressional Democrats, labor unions, and community safety and health advocates are attempting to revise the OSH Act to make it a felony with much higher penalties to commit a willful violation that results in the death of a worker. Some local prosecutors are charging company executives with manslaughter and other felonies when criminal negligence leads to the death of a worker.[49]
A New York Times investigation in 2003 showed that over the 20-year period from 1982 to 2002, 2,197 workers died in 1,242 incidents in which OSHA investigators concluded that employers had willfully violated workplace safety laws. In 93% of these fatality cases arising from wilful violation, OSHA made no referral to the U.S. Department of Justice for criminal prosecution.[50] The Times investigation found that OSHA had failed to pursue prosecution "even when employers had been cited before for the very same safety violation" and even in cases where multiple workers died. In interviews, current and former OSHA officials said that the low rates of criminal enforcement were the result of "a bureaucracy that works at every level to thwart criminal referrals. ... that fails to reward, and sometimes penalizes, those who push too hard for prosecution" and that " aggressive enforcement [was] suffocated by endless layers of review.[50]
OSHA has also been criticized for taking too long to develop new regulations. For instance, speaking about OSHA under the George W. Bush presidency on the specific issue of combustible dust explosions, Chemical Safety Board appointee Carolyn Merritt said: "The basic disappointment has been this attitude of no new regulation. They don't want the industry to be pestered. In some instances, the industry has to be pestered in order to comply."[51]
The director of OSHA is the Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health.[52]
This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.