Workplace
The Cruelest Cuts series
On Sunday and Monday, The Charlotte Observer published a two-part series detailing the risks to young workers in dangerous jobs. The stories showed that federal child labor enforcement has waned despite new evidence that many employers are ignoring the rules. Observer reporters also spoke to more than 20 current and former workers at House of…
Read MoreOccupational disability claims an epidemic at L.I.R.R.
An investigation by The New York Times has uncovered an epidemic of occupational disability claims among retirees of the Long Island Rail Road. “Virtually every career employee — as many as 97 percent in one recent year — applies for and gets disability payments soon after retirement, a computer analysis of federal records by The…
Read MoreLabor laws offer little protection to North Carolina workers
An investigation by Ames Alexander of the Charlotte Observer reveals that North Carolina has failed to protect employees who are fired in retaliation for filing workers compensation claims or blowing the whistle on unsafe practices. The newspaper found that few who seek help under the state’s anti-retaliation law wind up getting it. Of the roughly…
Read MoreLabor exploitation rampant in Chinese-owned mining companies
In China in Africa and China in Peru, parallel investigations for Bloomberg Markets, Simon Clark, Michael Smith and Franz Wild report on the exploitation of indigenous peoples by Chinese-owned mining companies in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The authors report that “hundreds of workers have been injured or killed since 2005 working for Chinese companies.”…
Read MoreUnsafe Haven series
Mary Zahn and Ben Poston of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel detailed the rising number of injuries and serious violations at nursing homes in the state of Wisconsin. The reporters reviewed more than 20,000 pages of documents and built their own database of accidents, injuries and deaths spanning the past 3 ½ years. They found that…
Read MoreDeadly Denial series
An investigation by the Rocky Mountain News examined the federal program to compensate the people who became sick building the nation’s nuclear weapons. The paper found that the agencies running the program, the U.S. Department of Labor and the Department of Health and Human Services, have derailed aid to workers by keeping reports secret from…
Read MoreConstruction deaths on rise in Vegas development boom
A package by the Las Vegas Sun looks at the steep increase in construction fatalities during the most recent development boom in the area. In less than 19 months, twelve construction workers have died, eclipsing the total number of fatalities during the growth and development of the 1990s. Experts blame the rise on poor oversight…
Read MoreIncident at CDC lab shines light on safety concerns
Following a failure in the ventilation system at the Centers for Disease Control facility, the door of a high-containment lab was sealed with duct tape, according to a report by Alison Young of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The air-flow failure lead to the potential exposure of nine CDC employees to Q fever, a potential bioterrorism agent.…
Read MoreReport shows FAA behind in training new air traffic controllers
An inspector general’s report shows the Federal Aviation Administration is hiring more air traffic controllers than it can effectively train, reports Michael J. Sniffen of the Associated Press. “The Transportation Department’s inspector general said the Federal Aviation Administration is so swamped with new hires that it has exceeded its own maximum trainee numbers at 22…
Read MoreRevisiting Willow Island
The Charleston (W.Va.) Gazette published a two-day package marking the 30th anniversary of the Willow Island Disaster, the largest construction accident in U.S. history. Fifty-one construction workers died on April 27, 1978, when a scaffold collapsed during construction of a coal-fired power plant along the Ohio River. The Gazette examines the disaster’s causes, interviews survivors…
Read More