OSHA and Small Businesses
This paper was an extra credit assignment for a class I took in Ergonomics with Dr. Del Kimbler. The paper is a look into the Occupational Safety and Health Association's regulations' affect on small businesses.
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Supporters of OSHA standards cite the importance of the safety of employees in all businesses have strong arguments to support them. Employees should be safe regardless of the size of their employers’ businesses. This is morally a common sense statement. No sane person would condone intentionally putting a worker in a situation likely to end in injury. Unfortunately many industries rely upon employees working daily in environments that are wrought with danger if not properly managed. On top of the obvious risks in many businesses there are now many recognized hazards that do not involve sharp edges or dangerous machines. Even a computer can be a danger due to cumulative stress disorders. Many jobs that do not require much physical labor can lead to repetitive motion and stress related injuries. These risks are harder to spot and often injuries go unrecorded because the effects are not immediate and the straw that breaks the camel’s back can be outside the workplace. Since most employers have not studied ergonomics, an outside source is needed to identify these hidden dangers and find ways to eliminate them. OSHA has guidelines that can protect employees from cumulative stress disorders and has the power to punish employers who do not protect employees. Unions are nearly always strong supporters of OSHA regulations, because workers can only benefit from higher standards of safety. Whether an employee works in a large plant or for a small construction team, he wants to know his employer is providing an environment that is a safe as is humanly possible. OSHA provides a quantifiable way to achieve this peace of mind. Either the business is complying with OSHA standards or it isn’t and the business is paying heavily for putting its employees in danger.
The problem encountered is the financial burden OSHA’s regulations place on the business owner. Big corporations with hundreds of thousands of dollars in overhead barely notices an extra couple of thousands of dollars spent on new safely equipment for the plant floor. For a small business, however, a few thousand dollars is an enormous sum of money to spend on something like stronger railings or a different type of protective gear that will never pay for itself in increased profits. If small businesses do not comply with OSHA standards that are extremely expensive for them, they can high fines and again it is much more difficult for the smaller business to handle than larger ones, despite the fact that often fines for smaller companies are less than penalties inflicted on large ones. OSHA is making an effort to make things easier on small businesses by reducing fines and eliminating some penalties for violations not considered serious. OSHA is also allowing employers to use some alternative safety methods that prove equally effective in protecting workers. Even with all these efforts, small businesses still suffer attempting to comply with OSHA standards.
The way OSHA is attempting to help small businesses is not only ineffective at fully benefiting employers, its creating an attitude that says employees who work for small businesses are less valuable than those working for large corporations. As wrong as this attitude is, perhaps instead of trying to make smaller companies compete with larger ones in terms of safety, make a completely different set of standards and put it down as a risk of working for a small company. Employees of small companies already deal with decreased benefits like incomplete health insurance and fewer days of paid vacation with small businesses, maybe they can also deal with decreased safety. Or employees can be informed about risks and choose to purchase or pay a certain percent of their own safety equipment, to reduce the financial burden on the employer. Employers that do comply with OSHA standards would appeal to employees and make them more competitive in business because of the reputation that would accompany the stamp of OSHA approval. The other plausible solution is for OSHA to dedicate some of the millions of dollars collected in fines and send it back to the companies trying to improve safety. Use that money as an incentive for small businesses to comply with safety standards. For example, if the company reduces its work-related injuries by 15% in 3 years by itself, OSHA will pay back 80% of the money taken in fines to finance implementing the remainder of the OSHA standards. This would help not only with the financial burden but would allow engineers trying to sell safety to management to offer a very real benefit in making long term investments and changes that would protect employees.
Click Here to veiw or download this document using Word.
Click Here to veiw or download this document using Word.
OSHA and Small Businesses
In 1970, the Occupational Safety and Health Act created OSHA to regulate safety and health of employees nationwide. When it began, most of the affected employees were in production or manufacturing, which was the focus of OSHA. The employers were generally large companies. Since that time, the focus of industry and of OSHA has shifted. More service industries are now targeted. Fewer employees are working for giant corporations and more are employed by small businesses and entrepreneurs. Since its conception, every regulation implemented by the OSHA is fought by employers. They claim the regulations are too expensive to implement or are counterproductive to their internal safety programs, or even that the science the regulation is based on is flawed. At the front lines of the fight against government regulations are small business owners. These employers lack the capital to implement some of the elaborate OSHA regulations and risk heavy fines or loss of their right to operate if they do not comply. OSHA has an obligation to consider the fiscal feasibility of the standards they set. However, feasibility is a very different thing to a multi-million dollar company than to a small business owner with only 15 employees. This is a problem being faced by OSHA, business owners and the U.S. government currently. The question soon becomes: do employers fight regulations for legitimate reasons or do they fight to avoid expensive workplace alterations? Should small businesses answer to different standards than large companies? Can the government in good conscience allow a double standard that could endanger employees but helps small businesses continue operating? These are important questions for workers, employers, and government officials. If the business owners are being honest, perhaps they can better regulate safety from within and the government should step back and give them more freedom. On the other hand, there is no guarantee that workers will not be placed in harm’s way if the government does not establish guidelines to protect them. Should employees working for larger corporations be safer than those working for small businesses?Supporters of OSHA standards cite the importance of the safety of employees in all businesses have strong arguments to support them. Employees should be safe regardless of the size of their employers’ businesses. This is morally a common sense statement. No sane person would condone intentionally putting a worker in a situation likely to end in injury. Unfortunately many industries rely upon employees working daily in environments that are wrought with danger if not properly managed. On top of the obvious risks in many businesses there are now many recognized hazards that do not involve sharp edges or dangerous machines. Even a computer can be a danger due to cumulative stress disorders. Many jobs that do not require much physical labor can lead to repetitive motion and stress related injuries. These risks are harder to spot and often injuries go unrecorded because the effects are not immediate and the straw that breaks the camel’s back can be outside the workplace. Since most employers have not studied ergonomics, an outside source is needed to identify these hidden dangers and find ways to eliminate them. OSHA has guidelines that can protect employees from cumulative stress disorders and has the power to punish employers who do not protect employees. Unions are nearly always strong supporters of OSHA regulations, because workers can only benefit from higher standards of safety. Whether an employee works in a large plant or for a small construction team, he wants to know his employer is providing an environment that is a safe as is humanly possible. OSHA provides a quantifiable way to achieve this peace of mind. Either the business is complying with OSHA standards or it isn’t and the business is paying heavily for putting its employees in danger.
The problem encountered is the financial burden OSHA’s regulations place on the business owner. Big corporations with hundreds of thousands of dollars in overhead barely notices an extra couple of thousands of dollars spent on new safely equipment for the plant floor. For a small business, however, a few thousand dollars is an enormous sum of money to spend on something like stronger railings or a different type of protective gear that will never pay for itself in increased profits. If small businesses do not comply with OSHA standards that are extremely expensive for them, they can high fines and again it is much more difficult for the smaller business to handle than larger ones, despite the fact that often fines for smaller companies are less than penalties inflicted on large ones. OSHA is making an effort to make things easier on small businesses by reducing fines and eliminating some penalties for violations not considered serious. OSHA is also allowing employers to use some alternative safety methods that prove equally effective in protecting workers. Even with all these efforts, small businesses still suffer attempting to comply with OSHA standards.
The way OSHA is attempting to help small businesses is not only ineffective at fully benefiting employers, its creating an attitude that says employees who work for small businesses are less valuable than those working for large corporations. As wrong as this attitude is, perhaps instead of trying to make smaller companies compete with larger ones in terms of safety, make a completely different set of standards and put it down as a risk of working for a small company. Employees of small companies already deal with decreased benefits like incomplete health insurance and fewer days of paid vacation with small businesses, maybe they can also deal with decreased safety. Or employees can be informed about risks and choose to purchase or pay a certain percent of their own safety equipment, to reduce the financial burden on the employer. Employers that do comply with OSHA standards would appeal to employees and make them more competitive in business because of the reputation that would accompany the stamp of OSHA approval. The other plausible solution is for OSHA to dedicate some of the millions of dollars collected in fines and send it back to the companies trying to improve safety. Use that money as an incentive for small businesses to comply with safety standards. For example, if the company reduces its work-related injuries by 15% in 3 years by itself, OSHA will pay back 80% of the money taken in fines to finance implementing the remainder of the OSHA standards. This would help not only with the financial burden but would allow engineers trying to sell safety to management to offer a very real benefit in making long term investments and changes that would protect employees.
Click Here to veiw or download this document using Word.
# posted by Abby-Wan Kenobi @ 2:26 PM 
