House Republican Budget Continues War on Worker Safety

[mahatmakanejeeves]

House Republican Budget Continues War on Worker Safety

September 7, 2017

The House of Representatives continued to wage its never-ending war on working people yesterday when the House Rules Committee voted to add 58 mostly anti-worker amendments to an already un-labor-friendly FY 2018 Labor-HHS Appropriations budget bill. That bill, you may remember, slashed the OSHA and MSHA enforcement budgets and eliminated the Susan Harwood Training Grant program. The House report had complained that “overreliance on enforcement in recent years has fostered a toxic environment between the agency and employers that is undermining the agency’s goals for workplace safety and is at odds with Federal policies that support economic growth and job creation.”

Working under the assumption that economic growth and job creation are incompatible with breathing, the Republicans are offering an amendment that would prohibit OSHA from enforcing its silica standard. The standard is already in effect for construction workers, but OSHA had postponed enforcement of its provisions until September 23. Another amendment would prohibit OSHA from enforcing its new recordkeeping rule which requires employers to send injury and illness information in to OSHA and prohibit employers from retaliating against workers for reporting injuries or illnesses. That retaliation sections of that rule are already in effect and employers are required to send data to OSHA by December 1. Another amendment would further reduce funding for MSHA, just when mine deaths are on the rise.

For those workers still alive and uninjured, Politico helpfully provides a summary of other anti-worker Republican amendments{.}

[disalitervisum]

1. Nothing surprising, the kocks and mercers and their ilk have been

systematically destroying the country with this kind of thing for decades, the saddest part is that we allow them to do it. Read "Dark Money" by Jane Mayer and see some of the arguments these despicable people make to further their cause. When they claim that controlling pollution causes a rise in skin cancer because pollution blocks the sun, and win the case in court, you know the judges were bought by the kocks. This was later overturned by the USSC, but it gives us an idea of what we are fighting.