I began to notice a trend back in late 2008. The number of folks reporting accidents within the USA started to drop sharply. At first glance a person might be led to believe that the ‘national layoff’ that occurred in the USA was the obvious reason. The thought being that if fewer people were working that fewer accidents were being reported. However, after a deeper study, we see that often times after layoffs instead of experiencing an ‘even work distribution’ we usually have a more lopsided situation in which ‘fewer people are doing more’ work. In fact, overtime is usually the only option for those lucky souls that didn’t get the hatchet.
I have been engaged in a recent study with a few of the top 20 liability and worker’s compensation insurance providers in the USA. We have a few ‘non-official results’ tallied. We have found that there was a ‘perceived fear’ that if employees reported accidents during the severe economic recession (2008-2010) they would lose their jobs or experience negative repercussions. This has been a sobering study because the obvious result could be a sudden increase in injury reporting as the economy rebounds.
It is also possible that many folks who may have been injured on the job did not report and are simply waiting until they perceive it is ‘safe’ to report. Those of us in the industry feel that this could result in a temporary spike in more serious cases. An example could be ‘back strains’ that went unreported that may now be ‘herniated disks injuries’. Back injury is only one example. There are many cases in which injuries could be underreported and later become a logistical nightmare to deal with.
If you are in the industry and have any feedback on this issue please send me an email with an explanation and your company name if you would like to be included in our study. Please annotate any oddities in your Corporate Health & Safety trends during this last economic recession.
kml
2010
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