excel worksheet and memo
Worker’s Compensation
Chapter 7
Accident Prevention Manual
For Business and Industry
Key Terms
- Workers Compensation
- Assumption of risk
- Negligence of fellow employee
- Contributory negligence
- Compulsory law
- FECA
- FELA
- Jones Act
- Exclusive remedy
- “course of employment”
- “arising out of”
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- Actual risk doctrine
- Positional risk doctrine
- Vocational Rehabilitation
- Temporary total disability
- Temporary partial disability
- Permanent partial disability
- Permanent total disability
- Whole person theory
- Wage loss theory
- Loss of wage earning capacity theory
Workers Compensation
- Legal system that states have established to ensure losses from workplace are compensated and those worksites that have greater risks will pay a greater proportion of the insurance costs.
Before Workers Compensation
- 3 Common Law Defenses
Assumption of Risk
Negligence of fellow employee
Contributory negligence
Favored the Employer
Assumption of Risk
- Employer not liable because the employee took the job with full knowledge of the risks and hazards involved.
Fellow Servant Rule
Employer not liable for injury to an employee that resulted from negligence of a fellow employee
Contributory Negligence
- Employer was not liable if the employee was injured due to his own negligence
Objectives of WC
Provide income and medical benefits
Provide exclusive remedy to avoid court delays and personal injury lawsuits
Relieve public and charities of financial drains
Eliminate payment fees to lawyers, expert witnesses and time consuming trials
Encourage maximum employer interest in safety
Promote study of causes of accidents
US Chamber of Commerce - 1995
Early Laws
- 1902 – Maryland- Cooperative accident insurance fund – death benefits only.
- 1908 – Congress passes first federal employers law
- 1909 – Montana passes miner WC law
- 1910 – NY passes hazardous jobs WC law
- 1911 – WI passes first real WC law for all workers
- 1916 – US Supreme Court declared WC laws to be constitutional
Today, 50 state laws, District of Columbia, Guam
and Puerto Rico have WC compensation laws
Compulsory or Elective
- Elective – employer may accept or reject the act.
- Compulsory – requires each employer to accept its provisions and provide benefits specified.
NO FAULT System
to Address
Worker and Family
Economic Losses
- Loss of earnings
- 66% of Average weekly salary up to max
- Tax free
- Waiting period 3 – 7 days
- Medical expenses
- Doctor choice?
Federal Employers Liability Act (FELA)
- The law was intended to cover railroad workers.
- In 1920, Congress extended FELA to seamen in what is now called Jones Act.
- FELA NOT workers compensation.
Federal Employers Liability Act (FELA)
- Gives an employee the right to charge employer with negligence
- Prevents employer from pleading the common defenses:
- Fellow servant and
- Assumption of risk.
- Substitutes comparative negligence for contributory negligence.
Jones Act Benefits
Maintenance
Cure
Negligence
Contributory Negligence
- Where a seaman is injured by an unseaworthy condition caused exclusively by the seaman’s own negligence recovery in an action for unseaworthiness will be denied.
- Where an employer has violated a safety statute or regulation, the seaman-plaintiff’s recovery will not be reduced proportionately under contributory negligence or assumption of risk.
- In the absence of a statutory violation, where a seaman is solely at fault in bringing about his or her injury, there can be no recovery under the Jones Act because proof of employer fault is a prerequisite to recovery.
- However, the mere fact that a seaman’s negligence creates a risk does not mean that the employer did not likewise contribute to the risk and ensuing injury.
- This could occur, for example, where an inexperienced, unsupervised seaman is ordered to perform tasks that he or she is not competent to perform or if the seaman is ordered to work in an unsafe or dangerous environment.
Degree of Disability
- Temporary total disability
- Temporary partial disability
- Permanent partial disability
- Permanent total disability
- Whole person
- Wage loss
- Loss of wage-earning capacity
Rehabilitation
- Medical Rehabilitation
- Receives whatever medical care is needed to treat the impairment and to restore lost function.
- Vocational Rehabilitation
- Prepares the injured worker for a new occupation or for ways of continuing in an old one.
Summary
- WC laws exist for all 50 states
- Jones Act and USL&H also applies in the GOM
- Learn about how to report accidents to the carrier.
- Learn about how to prepare defenses for Jones Act claims
- Setup return to work programs