OSHA Getting Tougher About Ergonomics

Pfhreakaz0id writes "Looks like the U.S. government is starting to (seriously) look at workplace injuires. See the story at CNN. Labor Secretary Alexis Herman says, 'Real people are suffering real injuries that can disable their bodies and destroy their lives.' Amen. Under the rules, a worker who has an ergonomic injury diagnosed by a doctor would be entitled to have the work environment fixed to relieve the cause -- by changing the height of an assembly line or computer keyboard, for example. "

Comments

Finally!

[Cheerio Boy]

Great! Maybe I can finally get the corporation to install somthing besides cubes and bad chairs. (http:\\www.poetictech.com) :-)

Re:Finally!

[technos]

Please! Pour some scalding hot grits down your pants! It'll be fun for all of us! While you're at it, how about a nice big bottle of nitric acid? That'll leave some scars to show the chicks! (If it leaves any flesh-like substance intact at all!)

But don't forget that most hospitals don't have in-room internet connections yet, so I guess you won't be able to post to /. all day long..

(The first post was funny. The second was slightly funny. The third was tired. The fourth deserves punishment, even if it has been 'Hand-Crafted' to stay on-topic.)

why penalize the employer?

[vyesue]

I'd like to know what obligates the employer to change his business procedures to accomodate physically unfit employees. Sure, if your business environment is unsafe or harmful to the employee, but really now, if you dont like it, quit and find another job. Companies would be fighting one another tooth and nail to provide an awesome work environment if people who had bad work environments quit and looked for another job.

Theres no reason an employer should have to provide special workstations for employees who have a problem typing all day long. Why in the world would you want to continue a job as a typist when you have CTS? That's just plain stupid.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[Cheerio Boy]

The point is NOT to penalize the employers but to get them to change the environment. Currently many employers figure that they don't have to worry about changing the environment because they feel that they can always hire someone else more desperate than the previous employee to do the same job. This is one of those cases where self-regulation either is not being applied or hasn't worked. When your company can't regulate itself - you can sure bet that someone from the outside will regulate it for you. As for physically unfit employees I feel the same way you do. If the injury is because of bad fitness then yes, the employer should be able to say "get healthy" and not pay a dime. Sounds cruel but it's how is needs to be done. We clamor about how people are taking responsibility out of our hands but we don't do anything to take charge of our own situations. And in case someone wants to say "sure he's probably healthy" I'm 5 feet 8 inches and weigh 240 lbs with a 200 count of cholesterol. Do I have health problems - yes. Do I let them interfere with my job - no.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[sirwired]

The reason for this is the legal principle that employers should not have a workplace that causes injury to the employees if the injuries can be easily prevented. Since the damage is already done by the time symptoms appear with many cases of CTS, regulations to prevent these injuries from happening in the workplace make a lot of sense. For many typists not in the IT industry (like secretaries), the "take this job and shove it" approach can be a disaster if the job market in your area is not exactly thriving. I don't think it is too much to ask for employers to purchase ergonomic workstations and I/O equipment.

As an analog to this situation think about a coal miner in Nowhere, WV, where the job market is in the toilet. If the only jobs avail. are in coal mines, do you think it is right for a mining company to negelect basic safety measures simply because the employees are free to quit if they think they have an unacceptable likelihood of dying? Yes, you won't die from typing too much, but you can suffer crippling injuries that are not too expensive to prevent.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[taniwha]

Ah! but I think that this is aimed at environments that are unsafe for employees. If you're working a chicken processing line in a small town in the rust-belt where there's no other work you can't just quit and find another job - and if 10% of all the people working on the line come down with an RSI then it's patently unsafe.

I think that these regulations are targetted at 2 sorts of workplaces - large ones where there is a known history of RSI-related problems (like the aforementioned poultry place) - these will have to make proactive changes to protect their employees - just like say a coal mine where people suffer from black lung disease would be required to provide clean air.

The second are small places where individuals come down with particular problems - for example if I come down with tendonitis (as I have for the past 10 years) because I'm a programmer then my employer will be required to take reasonable steps to protect me from health problems resulting from me performing my job - in my case a chair that comes to the right height and a trackball instead of a mouse seems to do the trick.

I think that one of the more general problems with RSIs is that they've only recently been recognised as something real - primarily because a bunch of white collar workers like me started coming down with them - before that induestry quietly burned through the chicken workers of the world without a big stink being raised

Re:why penalize the employer?

[vyesue]

how am I stupid? because I think it should be the responsibility of the worker to find suitable, safe and comfortable employment?

because I think it should be the responsibility of the employer to WANT to provide a good environment for their workers so that their workers dont all quit and go work somewhere better?

because I think that an employee has a responsibility to actively pursue a good situation for himself, instead of sitting back and expecting the federal government to regulate away all his troubles?

because I think that a situation where businesses are free to compete as they see fit is better than a situation where businesses hands are tied by a government that reacts to studies that it comissioned that arent even FINISHED?

if you're going to sit there on the other side of your little Anonymous Coward shield and call me stupid, you better at least be able to justify it. my opinions are the result of experience and reflection, and you respond to them with an infantile insult.

thanks for playing.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[vyesue]

well, if it's aimed at workplaces that are unsafe, thats cool, but I just dont think it's real sane to come up with a law that ends up regulating every company in america.

I'm not opposed to companies having good (or great) conditions for their employees. I work for a company that has awesome working conditions. but we're that way not because we're tryign to follow every law that comes down the pike regardign employee conditions, but because we dont anyone to quit because it's unpleasant or painful to work.

the answer to every problem is not "Pass more laws." maybe if the business sector was allowed to operate freely AND people were smart enough to voice their opinions by no longer allowing a company to use their labor to profit (ie, QUIT), then working conditions would get better.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[Bobort]

What you say is very reasonable, but I think it is a bit naive to assume that the laws will be applied in such a reasonable manner. From what I've seen, enforcement of OSHA regulations tends to be very much in the letter-of-the-law spirit. That may decrease the amount of injuries in the long run, but it's certainly an inefficient and obnoxious way to go. There's no a priori reason to suspect that the regulations will be any more well thought out for the long-run than companies' current policies are.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[dillon_rinker]

From the first sentence of the article...

Employers would have to correct injury-causing workplace conditions...

Sounds good to me. Perhaps you disagree - perhaps employers should NOT have to correct "injury-causing workplace conditions"? This has nothing to do with employees who are unfit and everything to do with keeping employees safe.

Why in the world would you want to continue a job as a typist when you have CTS?
Because you can't afford any time between jobs. Because you have bills you need to pay. Because you have kids to feed. If you'd ever been in this situation, you'd understand. If you never have, then consider yourself lucky. Not everyone can afford to find a new job. Not everyone has the requisite skills for finding a better job. And no employer should be permitted to cause injury to epmloyees through negligence.

This is not just about typists, you know. A friend of mine worked in tech support for a major OEM (think spots). She developed carpal tunnel syndrome. Although the IS department had a number of "ergonomic" keyboards and mice in stock, the management wouldn't authorize their use. I was told that if they let some people have them, then everyone would want them. She was in pain whenever she had to type. I should point out that this didn't happen until a year after she had started working there. It is not unreasonable to believe that her work has a contributing factor to her injury.

I have no problem with saying that if a potential employee can't do the job, for whatever reason, then an employer shouldn't have to change the job description to suit the employee. But if workplace conditions have been demonstrated to cause injury, then I am definitely in favor of requiring the employer to make changes.

Re:why penalize the employer?

[Sethb]

Yes, but there are some of us who desperately need the OSHA laws to make our workplace better. I am a support specialist at a public university, not the one my web page is at. Our "workroom", where my desk is, is about 20'x10', and contains three full-time people, with no partitions between us.

There is one window, which only one of us can see out of. The room is ONE electrical circuit, housing twelve computers and monitors, a switch, two mini-refrigerators, a host of laptops, lights for the workbench, fans to keep us cool because we can't even open our window to get rid of excess heat.

Our circuit is so overloaded, that we can't have all the monitors turned on at the same time (we have several servers in the room) without tripping the breaker. The wiring is a fire marshal's nightmare, now add in the fact that there may be from two to four students also working in the room at the same time, and you have a situation in which fire could easily break out, in which I have difficulty walking around all the chairs, equipment, etc. to get to my desk when I'm calm and not on fire.

So why don't I complain? Why doesn't the University give us more space? Well, when I do, they tell me that we'll get more space in two years, when another building is done being renovated, and that we just have to suffer for now. Our desks are hand-me-downs that were being thrown out, they're not even remotely ergonomic. Our chairs are the cheapest of the cheap office furniture, my cheap-o $128 chair from Staples that I use at home is twice as comfortable as my work chair. I've requested a Kinesis keyboard multiple times, but have had to use an old Microsoft Natural that I dug out of a closet, because I'm told we can't afford it in the budget.

In short, I'd love for ergonomics to be law. Every couple weeks, when I get fed up, I get very close to making an anonymous call to the fire marshal to have him inspect our office. I really don't dislike my supervisors, but I can't work in this environment for another two years, but this would at least force them to make some immediate changes or be fined.

It wouldn't get me an ergonomic keyboard, but I don't feel I should have to buy work equipment to do my job adequately. Should I also pay for my desk and chair? What about my computer I use? The phone bill? The power I consume? I think not.
---

Filling in ADA's gap

[EngrBohn]

If the injuries are severe enough, the Americans with Disabilities Act takes effect. For example:

• Under ADA, my organization was required to arrange for a 35" TV to be attached to a PC running in 640x480 mode so that he could use the PC (granted, this wasn't due to work-related injuries).
• Someone I work with has carpal-tunnel syndrome so bad (this is a work-related injury) that our organization was required to arrange for voice-recognition SW & headset for her -- the good side is she can now prepare documents far, far faster than anyone else can.

This move is clearly intended to prevent work-related injuries from getting so bad that ADA kicks in.
Christopher A. Bohn

Re:Filling in ADA's gap

[ucblockhead]

the good side is she can now prepare documents far, far faster than anyone else can

That is not particularly uncommon. Most of the changes that would be required are actually in the companies' own best interest, but the PHBs in charge are too clueless to figure it out. Much of this is because the cost of a better keyboard is obvious on the balance sheet while the productivity loss an employee suffers because typing is painful is invisible.

It is similar to the way study after study has shown that programmers working in offices with closable doors have two or more times the productivity. And yet 95%+ of us are still stuck in cubicles.

More Lawsuits Coming...

[TCook]

So now employers will be forced to hire workers that fit a specific height requirement. Then the vertically challenged (I just love being P.C.) will sue because they were discriminated against.

I'm sure there were well intended purposes for this but unless it's tightly regulated it'll be another out of control loop hole for the 'lawsuit lottery'.

hasty waste of money

[twitter]

The proposed rules don't even sound good in theory. The NYT is running an article on this too (here). Among other things, the Administration is not even waiting for the return of the NSF study they ordered. The threshold for action is very low, one accident, and predicted costs are up to $18 billion dolars.

A good friend of mine designs workstations for large companies and can see that this is not going to do anyone much good. They've been spending a ton of money on this already, throwing out pefectly good funiture for new more "ergonomic" stuff. Mostly, it's been going to overwheight whiners who would be better off if they simply exercised and tried to keep healthy. A thousand dollar chair won't solve their problems. Data entry people and others who could really benifit won't.

On the blue colar front, the low threshold will waste more than it fixes. As a former RPS PM loader, I can assure everyone that manual labor will wear you out regardless of back protectors, converyor belts, bells, whistles, or a federally mandated desk jockey! No amount of coaching can prevent accidents, and people who lift 50lb boxes all day will eventually suffer back problems.

Re:hasty waste of money

[Kyrrin]

> Mostly, it's been going to overwheight whiners who would be better off
> if they simply exercised and tried to keep healthy. A thousand
> dollar chair won't solve their problems.

So, you're fortunate enough to not have RSI problems. That's great for you, and I really am honestly happy that you don't encounter the kind of pain that I live with every day.

Not everyone is as fortunate, however. I work at a job -- not programming; it's more data-entry and information processing -- where I need to spend nearly seven and a half hours every day sitting in front of my keyboard typing away. My employer, when designing the office, took *none* of the standard ergonomic guidelines into effect. The desks are ridiculously high, the keyboard trays that have been supplied break at the slightest hint of pressure, and the chairs are only mildly adjustable; the keyboards are ridiculously small, particularly for those of us with very large hands, and each individual workstation can only be customized so far. After *one* hour of sitting and typing, I was in so much pain that I couldn't even make a fist.

I went to the doctor back in February (I'd been diagnosed with carpal tunnel previously, and was doing just fine with it, based on sane and sensible guidelines for my home workstation) and got a specialist to order that my workstation at work be altered to provide a more ergonomic work environment. My company attempted to weasel out of things by stating that their workstations already were ergonomic, without providing any support for that statement and ignoring my assertation that the existing equipment was doing more harm than good. It is now November, and I will estimate that I lost nearly a month's productive time before finally having the surgery performed -- a step that might not have been necessary had I gotten the support I needed beforehand.

It seems to me that legislation such as this is a *good* thing. If we can prevent these problems before they reach the state that mine has gotten to, where I need a total of two and a half months off work for the surgery and the physical therapy, not only will it benefit the *worker* (no one should ever, *ever* have to physically destroy him or herself for a job) but it will also benefit the corporation (less employee absence, more productivity).

Sometimes, legislation is *necessary*. Corporations are unwilling to Do The Right Thing by themselves a lot of the time; it takes a fairly big stick to convince them.

As for people who have RSI problems being "whiners" -- I had reached the point where I was physically incapable of making a fist. Not just because of the pain, which is crippling, but because the muscles *refused to listen*. You cannot drive when you cannot grip the steering wheel. Among many other things. I have a remarkably high pain threshold, but living with debilitating pain /constantly/ will wear nearly anyone down. Some people are more susceptible to RSI injuries than others, and preventative measures will only take you so far. It's about time that someone forced these bastards who abuse their workers and claim that their conditions are all psychosomatic to wake up and smell the coffee.

Re:Great!

[jd]

Sorry, out of luck. If you can prove you've suffered mental damage from Windows, your employers could claim you were mentally unfit to testify in court that you suffered mental damage from Windows.

Either way, they win. Why do you think companies insist on using Windows?

OHSA and ergonomics

[swordgeek]

Interesting stuff, and to some extent, long overdue. However, there are some serious complications implied.

Ergonomics is an odd and 'fluid' science, which is still pretty young. People are too variable. There is no magic formula that relates desk, chair, keyboard, and monitor heights (and distances) to a person's size and shape. Two 180cm guys, both weighing 77kg, and having the same inseam length, may still have different ergonomic requirements, based on things as indirect as how they walk, and whether they cross country ski.

Also, consider that no environment, no matter how ergonomic, will be a good solution for someone sitting for ten hours without taking a break. In fact one of the current ergonomic theories is based on the idea that, "your best position is your next one." In other words, staying in one position will ultimately cause problems.

So the question is, who decides what is or isn't ergonomically correct? If you have an assembly line that changes in height from one end to the other, and someone is placed at what should be the "correct" place along it for their height, is the company liable for them developing back problems because their hips are sloped inwards? Is a company responsible for an employee who developed RSI, when records show that they didn't take their appointed coffee breaks?

None of which, of course, should take away frmo the point of the law--to eliminate universally _bad_ ergonomics from the workplace.

Re:Why moderate up a troll?

[vyesue]

OK, lets take this real slow for those of you in the back of the room:

1. you have a job
2. you get hurt on the job
3. if your employer is negligent, you prove it in a court and get a hefty cash award

You have now been injured and then compensated by your employer. You have 3 choices:

1. go back to work and hope you dont get hurt again
2. go back to work and whine about how conditions are shitty and more people like you are going to get hurt and maybe you'll even get hurt again and we should change policy around here and why is my mouse making my hand hurt and why are these lights so bright and if they dont reconfigure my workstation I'm going to sue again
3. QUIT, FIND A JOB WHERE YOU WONT INJURE YOURSELF ANYMORE.

(note, I capitalized the correct answer to help you figure out what's going on.)

explanation/answer key:

if you go back to work and dont complain, nothing will change.

if you go back to work and complain and generally be a nuisance; if you invoke these laws to improve the environment, then perhaps the environment will get better.

if you quit, the company will be FORCED to notice the reasons for you quitting and the fact that you are no longer there. they can rehire some new employee to replace you, but if things are that bad, he'll quit too. the employer will have to make some changes in the environment or he will not be able to retain any employees.

did you notice that the outcome is essentially the same in situations 2 and 3? basically, the only differences in these two situations is that in situation 3, the employee had to TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR HIS SITUATION and TAKE ACTION.

so, I repeat:

Why in the world would you want to continue a job as a typist when you have CTS? That's just plain stupid.

Re:OK to say "get healthy" and not pay a dime?

[Cheerio Boy]

Let me clarify.

First, there a far more people out there that are _totally_ capable of cleaning up their bodies so as to be in good shape. Period. Quite a number of people, myself included, just don't take care of their body properly.

Second, there is a general level of health for the human body. Doctors know it, nutritionists know it, event the people with bodily problems know it. This is something that can be quantified and checked for. If the person is not maintaining that standard then they should - FOR THEIR OWN SAKE IF NOTHING ELSE!!!

Third, I said nothing about removing medical benefits. HOWEVER, if the person is not up to the basic standards of health then something has to be done. This, in reality, is the responsibility of the person in question. It's their body - they have to live with it every day - so they should be required to maintain it.

As for providing a statement of their general health being an invasion of privacy - didn't you have to get a physical and drug test before starting a job? I did. If the person has a TRUE medical condition and _can't_ get healthy then that person should not mind providing that information to the employer.

And finally, before you flame me on that last statement, the employer should not be able to dismiss/refuse to hire the person because of a medical condition. The employer should work with the employee in getting himself/herself up to snuff so that both parties can be productive and happy. If, and only if, the person has a true medical condition that can not otherwise be solved should the employer make a large amount of special arrangements.

Should the employer optimize the environment for his employees - yes absolutely.

Should he be made to alter every little thing to fit every type of person - no. It's impossible to do that.

why not self-regulation?

[Arctic Fox]

This seems to be one of those cases where self-regulation would be the better answer.
The company I'm consulting for has the following policy. "It's cheaper for us to get you comfortable equipment than it is to pay for your health problems, all you have to do is ask."
The regular chairs here are nice, but the guy across the hall had a car accident, requested another chair. The damned thing is tooo complicated for anyone to use. It's a web-type thing with 90 adjustments and controls. When it's properly configured, it's great. When it's not....

This is yet another instance where slime-ball lawyers smell a buck and will get on it.

If your company wont get you a chair because you need one, then maybe you should look for another company.

Regulation and hidden effects

[timothy]

A lot of people posting here seem (despite misgivings about the specifics) to agree with the general thrust of the ADA / OSHA moves toward micro-regualtion of work environments.

I feel just the opposite, and here's why: by specifying "better" workplaces (certain fixed measurements / ratios or ranges of ratios / measurements for particular situations, say, or specifying the "correct" tilt of a keyboard)
the government wraps a tourniquet about the leg of new ideas. (To forge an awful metaphor.) They also considerably raise the cost of entry to start-ups.

There are a lot of ergonomically awful products in the world -- keyboards that feel awful, chairs that suck. Why do they sell? Because in the short term, they often offer an acceptable solution, at least in light of the cost of other available solutions. I'm told that Hermann Miller Aeron chairs are very comfy; I'm promised one soon. The reason that not everyone is presently sitting in an Aeron is pretty simple - look at the pricetag!

And as others have pointed out, no amount of tables, graphs and statistics can account for the subtle things which make some people comfortable with desk Y and keyboard Z, and others not.

There's less incentive to work on radically *more* comfortable products if there is an accepted "Good Enough to Avoid Prosecution" level ... has anyone tried a Twiddler keyboard? There's a learning curve (I'm no expert, but I like it) -- bureacratic rule-making tends to ignore things like this.

Government rule makers often do co-opt some good ideas (think the NHSTB invented the 3-point belt? Thank Volvo they didn't.), but there is a calcification which results when standards are legislated rather than allowed to bloom or die.

Some people counter this argument by saying that "We can't make compromises when it comes to safety!" Balderdash. I bet in 5 minutes you could think of a dozen examples where you've done exactly that, and with justification -- because a) perfect safety is an illusion and b) safety is just one of many factors acting on us. Have you ever gone 74 in a 70mph zone? Have you ever not worn a seatbelt on the way to the corner store? Have you ever biked without a helmet? Have you ever attended a concert without earplugs?

I don't like the term "safety Nazi" because I think it belittles the evil the Nazis perpetrated, but it would be accurate to call those who have been so labeled "safety fascists," because that is essentially is what fascism is all about: there is nominal private ownership of resources, but the disposition of those resources is in large part directed from above. "Sure, you own this small business. But unless you buy new (expensive) light fixtures, replace your old-style doorknobs with (more expensive) new-style ones, and install an elevator to the third floor for (potentially) diabled employees, afraid you can't run it without facing prosecution and possible fines. Oh, and by the way, you're guilty. Please direct all complaints to ..."

timothy

Re:Regulation and hidden effects

[superbusterrific]

Poor, poor start-ups. They can't compete unless they can burn through employees like firewood. In case you didn't know, the rate of work-related death in the US was VERY much higher before OSHA was established. Sure, they micro-manage too much, but the alternative is the free market. And the free market has NO respect for a worker's health or well-being. Easy enough for you to say "They can just quit and get a new job." What if all the jobs have the same hazards? What good does it do then to have the freedom to quit? You WILL end up paying for a worker crippled by RSI. Either through increased cost to business or social services and medical care for people who can't work anymore. The main thrust of OSHA regulation is TRAINING, and that is the main thing that is missing from the current office workplace. If people are trained in proper ergonomics, and empowered to demand the equipment they need, they will do much better overall. I don't need to justify my opinion by saying that MONEY will ultimately be saved or generated by an office ergonomic standard. For me, the health of my users is justification enough. But if you need that reason; YES, it will be CHEAPER in the long run to train computer users than to pay for their rehabilitation or care. -- SuperBusTerrific

Re:What *Really* Causes RSI?

[Pascal Q. Porcupine]

It's probably because you don't touch-type properly. Proper touch-typing keeps the wrists rather still, and involves a lot of flexing of the fingers, whereas the half-assed touch-typing that most people do involves more hand movement and less finger movement. Everyone I know who types as much as me who doesn't touch-type has little to no wrist problems, whereas I've touch-typed properly since I was 8 (I was bored and had a C64) and so I've had various carpal tunnel problems on and off for the last few years. My solution to it is to use programs like xwrits to force myself to not type for very long periods of time and to occasionally switch between various keyboards (a cheapo MS Natural clone, a DataHand, and a few others) and try to vary my typing style. For example, right now I'm typing with the cheapo Natural clone and using a semi-lackluster touchtyping style, though I've kinda been spoiled by the Datahand's keyboard layout, but I'm doing a pretty good job of letting my hands do most of the work rather than my fingers.
---
"'Is not a quine' is not a quine" is a quine.

Why only talk of keyboards and mice?

[oneiros27]

I mean, there's plenty of other areas where people can get Carpel Tunnel/ RSI/ whatever.

Here's just a small example:

• http://live.av.com/scripts/editorial.dll?bfromind= 940&eeid=990341&eetype=articl e&render=y&ck=

Sure, it's about someone working as a phone sex operator, and masterbating too much, but still, they have a legitimate problem, too.

Personally, I don't touch type, so because I move my hands how I feel they're comfortable, I don't tend to have so much problem with typing for long periods of time, although I'm not 100% accurate. (which I attribute to mental mistakes more than physical typing difficulties).

And writing with common stylii (whatever the plural of stylus is) hurts more than typing or using a mouse... especially for those of us who don't hold a pencil 'correctly' in the first place (lefties being the most common ones, and I learned to write from a lefty), but imagine taking 3 years of drafting classes, trying to write ANSI compliant letters, and holding your pencils completely ass-backwards...

Who pays? Employees.

[davie]

Those of you who think you're going to use these regulations to sock it to your "evil" employer, think again. You're going to pay for the new chairs, the nice monitors, etc., not your employer. Employers consider more than salary or wage when calculating what it costs to employ someone. Things like new chairs, tables and ergonomically-designed keyboards cost money, and those costs are factored against the employee. The higher the cost related to furniture, better equipment, etc., the higher the cost of keeping your ass in the seat. Think about that next time you go to your boss to ask for a raise--he will, I guarantee it.

Increased regulation makes me nervous as hell

[jht]

Yes, I know RSI is a real problem, and I agree that employers should be sufficiently responsible about the workplace environment so that the chances are minimized that any employee will suffer injuries of that nature.

That said, I have a big problem with OSHA sticking their nose into this. The business of OSHA is to (if you feel they are a legitimate governmental authority - I have a philosophical opposition to their existence) prevent workers from getting maimed and killed. OSHA is for the construction sites, the meat-packing plants, and the assembly lines of the nation (places where workers are at significant risk of bodily harm), not the white-collar offices. Existing workers' compensation law should be more than sufficient to allow the free market to deal with RSI - if the employer does not make fairly inexpensive adjustments for the benefit of their employees, there will be more workers' comp claims and higher turnover, resulting in higher costs to the employer (insurance, legal, and training costs). It is to the economic advantage of the employer to provide a reasonable environment to their employees. If I'm productive at my task, my employer will make sure I'm properly equipped to do my job in reasonable comfort - if I'm not, they'll fire my butt. My company, as an example, is happy to provide trackballs, ergo keyboards, keyboard trays, and adjustable chairs to try to make the workplace as comfortable as we can for our employees. But we haven't worried about measurements to specific OSHA-inlicted guidelines or any of that crap - we do it because comfortable employees are happier and get more done as a result. It just makes sense.

The problem as I see it is that OSHA, like any governmental bureaucracy, has an institutional need to impose (without legislative mandate) more and more rules on the workplace in order to demonstrate their (OSHA's) effectiveness and justify their continued existence. Simply monitoring and enforcing a minimum of rules doesn't justify bigger budgets and pay raises for the people who work there and OSHA's constituencies on the Hill. This applies to virtually all the commissions and agencies (like the EPA, EEOC, and OSHA, to name the most egregious offenders) that exist outside the traditional Cabinet-level structure and most of the ones that are in it, too. It's just an ever-expanding mandate - will they regulate your home office - or Rob's, or Hemos' house once it's rebuilt as their next action "for your safety"?

This most recent Congress has been, by most conventional measures, a spectacularly inefficient one - nothing of any substance has been passed due to the partisan gridlock that's prevailed ever since the Clinton investigation kicked into high gear. And you know what? It's been successful as all hell. It appears that the nation does just fine without Congress passing laws - somehow we're just able to get over it, pick ourselves up, and continue building this economy to unheard-of heights. Coincidence? I doubt it. I'm a firm believer in the general philosophy of "that government governs best which governs least".

Hey - my cat wants to sit on my lap while I'm typing this - does this have OSHA implications?

- -Josh Turiel

Re:Increased regulation makes me nervous as hell

[jht]

Obviously, RSI is a Bad Thing. I won't challenge that (I've been whacked by that myself), and my hands have been known to get sore from over-keyboarding, too. I'm working on a book right now, and it's not easy to pound out the words. Handwriting can be difficult for me, and I have some trouble at times playing golf, a sport which I am very fond of. As soon as Dragon ships their Mac version, I'm all over it.

My concern is with the way the government chooses to meddle. Should Congress pass a law stating that chemicals must be labelled (to use one example from your comment), I have no problem with that. Congress consists of elected officials, who are accountable to their constituents. Without digressing into my personal opinion of Congress, I'll say that if the Congressperson's constituents do not approve of the law, they can make it known to said Congressperson who can vote for or against it. I assume here that Congresspersons wish to appeal to a majority of the people they represent, and will take that into account when deciding how to vote.

I'm going to exaggerate here deliberately for the sake of illustrating my point, but part of the question when considering regulations are an "opportunity cost" - if a regulation would cost $1 billion, and save 2 lives, that's a cost of $500 million per life saved. Is that worth it? Yes, if you're the immediate family of thse two people (or one of them yourself), but that cost implies that approximately $2,000 comes out of each and every one of our pockets to save one of those people. Is the cost to society as a whole worth it? Probably not. Is it worth, say, an extra $30 per year (maybe not directly in taxes, but in increased cost for goods) to save 2 people? Maybe. To save 100 people? Probably. 1000? Definitely. And so forth and so on. The actual numbers here aren't meant to say anything other than that there's a cost to every regulation, regardless of intent. Politicians are accountable for that - spend too much of my money on things I don't value and I will vote to remove you from office. If a plurality of votors agree, you're removed, to be replaced by someone we agree with. If I vote against you and lose, then that's fine - the people have a different priority and I'll live with that (unless I'm one of the two people not saved - oof!). In reality, I might well vote to spend the money to save those people. Or I might not. It depends.

Mind you, I understand well where you're coming from - at my old company I was responsible for the network and the people who operated the imagesetters and proofing equipment - we mixed our own developer and toner (we called going for fresh water to mix with "making a soup run"). We kept the MSDS sheets for everything, installed everything possible to keep the environment safe, and installed eye protection kits and wash stations. It was nasty stuff, but we had to do it - again, because we wanted to keep employees. Ironically, we weren't too good about things like wristrests or keyboard trays but hazmat - we had that nailed. My current company doesn't do any of that but, as I said, the goals are the same.

In OSHA, we have a group that has no accountability to anybody formulating rules based on their need to keep regulating to survive. If OSHA wants to inflict a rule (not necessarily this one, mind you) that has a destructive impact on the economy, they can go ahead and do so - nobody will vote them out of office. Once OSHA was created, they were given the authority to do what they saw fit - and Congress gets to stay out of it. Regulations are better addressed through laws passed by lawmakers, not rules passed by an agency. Remember "Know Your Customer"? Or the Clipper Chip? Things like that happen when there is no direct accountability to the voters/taxpayers. Congress should pass the regulations, and OSHA, if it existed in my world, would make sure those regulations were enforced. Your textile workers and industrial workers would still be protected all the same. That's the beauty of our system, flawed though it is.

I'm not willing (despite my obviously Libertarian leanings) to go out on a limb and say the invisible hand of the market can address every single ill - that's terribly impractical even if it's technically "the Right Thing". But our ills should be addressed by accountable politicians, not unelected bureaucrats.

- -Josh Turiel

Hmmm....

[E-Rock]

I'm not unsympathetic, I just don't understand. In a normal office (factory conditions are obviously different) what could you do to render yourself unable to use your hands?
Is it something a new keyboard could really fix, or a new desk or any new hardware? Give me examples because I am obviously unaware of them.

We live in the most sue happy period and the excessively large awards handed out have just fueled it to new heights. To a very removed observer this just looks like more of the same. The defective part isn't the one most often serviced; it is the squeaky (or in my terminology bitchy) wheel.

A possibility that bothers me...

[cswiii]

First of all, I believe the gov't has good intentions in mind with these new regulations. But the problem lay in the reactionary response to said action. For example, to avoid potential lawsuits and other issues with these new regulations, it seems to me very likely that many companies will require, no questions asked, X, Y and Z Ergo components be used by employees.

Now what if, for example, I don't like ergo keyboards (which I don't)? In addition to loss of efficiency in adjusting to the new keyboard (would be a lot of time -- I'm not a particularly orthodox typist), I simply don't find them comfortable... not to mention a wristrest and the occasional position change pretty much solves my problems.

Nonetheless, to avoid potential costly lawsuits, my company could concievably require employees to use said ergonomic components. If they don't? tough... the liability falls on the employee. A regulation created to protect the employee becomes a liability and potential threat to his employment, should he not comply -- or at very least, gives the employer more grounds to dismiss employees on a whim, "those troublemakers, rabblerousers, who can't comply with policy".

Am I overreacting? Perhaps. Is it a possibility? Just watch.