You’re not the only one trying to reduce workers’ comp bills
July 23, 2010 by Fred HosierPosted in: In this week's e-newsletter, Latest News & Views, Workers' comp, cost of safety
How much do you think federal government employees collected in workers’ comp payments in fiscal year 2009? A. $5.2 million? B. $40.3 million? C. $145 million? D. $1.6 billion.
If you guessed $1.6 billion, you’re right. Federal employees filed more than 79,000 new claims, and that doesn’t include the Postal Service.
President Obama has announced a four-year program to reduce injuries and related costs. It’s called POWER: Protecting Our Workers and Ensuring Reemployment.
The program doesn’t have specific goals, at least not yet.
But by the end of FY 2014, federal agencies must improve performance in seven areas:
- Reduce total injury and illness case rates.
- Reduce lost time injury and illness case rates.
- Analyze lost time injury and illness data.
- Increase the timely filing of workers’ compensation claims.
- Increase the timely filing of wage-loss claims.
- Reduce lost production day rates, and
- Speed employees’ return to work in cases of serious injury or illness.
Sound familiar? It seems, to save money, the federal government has to pursue the same safety goals as private businesses.
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Tags: federal government employees, reduce costs, Workers' comp
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July 22nd, 2010 at 7:07 am
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July 22nd, 2010 at 8:58 am
President Obama can come up with whatever program he wants, but it’s not going to be effective. With all the conglomeration of rules and regulations, Government Employees will continue to use the Workers Comp system to its fullest. Because they are Government Employees, and Government does not create its own income, naturally the Private Business sector pays for it all. The government sector has gotten so large now, it is almost impossible to be fixed. If our Founding Fathers were alive today, they would be very ashamed to see the condition this Government is in today.
July 27th, 2010 at 8:24 am
So, by 2014 federal agencies will have to do what private business has been having to do for the last 40 years. Some would this progress. I call it ludicrous that there apparently is, and has been, a double standard in place.
Rummy - I hate to say it, but I agree with you that, in essense, nothing will change, performance goals or not.
July 28th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
The second paragraph of the article indicates “$1.6 million”. If it refers to answer “D” in the opening question, it should be “$1.6 billion”.
July 28th, 2010 at 3:11 pm
Good catch. We’ve corrected the article.
August 4th, 2010 at 3:54 pm
This is almost laughable…didn’t I just see today where there were countless government employees bilking SSD for payments while still working at their jobs?
This is just more of the same….you still have to deal with people being people and now the government is supposed to come up with ideas to reduce their incident rates? You’d think that with all the OSHA investigations and fines levied that they would already have the answers. Must be that in government, safety doesn’t really start at the top!
August 4th, 2010 at 4:18 pm
Lets look at another side of W/C. There are alot of good employers and MANY bad employees. They do not want to return to work, they want to use the system, stay at home, play and get paid. I see it everyday as an occ med nurse. Very sad. If these type of employees were “injured” at home they would heal and not carry on nor would they spend there own money to seek medical attention.
August 5th, 2010 at 8:27 am
Typical governmental double-talk. The major tenet of all government employees is job preservation. Whether elected, appointed, or hired, it’s all about justifying their existence and milking the system. It’s self-perpetuating and a huge waste of taxpayer money.
Jeff - I think you’re right about the double-dipping.
K.Cleek - The examples you cite of lazy employees is a major reason why this country is losing its edge in the global economy. We pay too many people to do too little.