Will Proposed Ergonomic Rule Prove Prohibitive? - Brief Article - Review - book review

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), August, 2000

After a nearly 10-year study, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has released a proposed ergonomics standard that will likely cost billions of dollars more to implement than it estimates. OSHA also overstates the benefits that will result from the new rule, according to a report from the Center for the Study of American Business (CSAB) at Washington University in St. Louis (Mo.).

In "Ergonomics by OSHA ... Ergo, Outgo by Business," Richard J. Mahoney and Milka S. Kirova assess the data on the costs and benefits of the proposed new ergonomics standard that they suggest "could become the new millennium's first major regulatory confrontation between government and business." The purpose of the new OSHA rule is to reduce the number and severity of work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs). OSHA says the new regulation will prevent 300,000 work injuries and generate $9,000,000,000 in savings each year, at an annual cost of $4,200,000,000.

An array of injuries is included in the MSD grouping. Carpal tunnel syndrome (hand injuries believed to be caused by awkward or repetitive motions such as typing and computer processing)is often cited as a major reason for the proposed new standard, but it has been extended to include a variety of sprains, strains, and aches caused by overexertion and other factors.

Mahoney and Kirova say few will argue that such injuries--some permanent--are trivial or unworthy of preventive measures. Indeed, major corporations have been working on the ergonomics problem for years because of their obvious self-interest in having healthy employees. Business groups insist that they are already on a path to fix what they know how to fix, but that many of the injury causes are not known and may not even be work-related. OSHA's cost and benefit estimates of the new ergonomics standard are also disputed.

To compute the total costs of compliance with the proposed rule, OSHA has estimated the annual expenses for each of some 350 specific industries, then added them up for a total of $4,200,000,000 each year. That includes the costs to employers to maintain an injured employee's current net take-home pay (90% of it if the worker is absent) and benefits for up to six months.

The CSAB report, though, finds that alternative estimates of the annual costs of compliance with the OSHA ergonomics rule may reach $100,000,000,000. A key point is OSHA's assumption that half of all workers and employers will not be affected by the proposed rule because they have already established voluntary ergonomics programs. However, many of the establishments that have implemented some controls to reduce ergonomics hazards lack key program components that would be required under the rule. Thus, the proposed rule would affect many more businesses than OSHA assumes in its cost analysis.

Mahoney and Kirova also find that OSHA's estimates of the number of averted MSDs due to the proposed rule--around 300,000 each year over 10 years--seem overly optimistic. "Businesses that have established programs on their own have, presumably, already been enjoying their beneficial effects. OSHA's analysis seems to omit these already realized benefits, which is a fundamental flaw in the agency's procedure." OSHA estimates that employers would save $22,546 per averted MSD, for a total of $9,100,000,000 each year, a savings benefit about seven times the medical costs--nearly twice the common industry assumption.

The CSAB report concludes that, instead of the "one-size-fits all" approach OSHA is taking on the proposed new ergonomics standard, the agency could collaborate with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health on serious studies into the real causes of MSDs as well as provide a clearinghouse for collection and dissemination of "what works" with ergonomics problems. "In the absence of these positive steps, we will invariably find a protracted battle among regulators, business, Congress, and the courts `settling the issue' while avoidable injuries continue," Mahoney and Kirova caution.