workplace safety

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Prime Day Brings Deals— but Also Warehouse Injuries

Senate investigation calls out Amazon for 'extraordinarily high level' of injured workers

(Newser) - Amazon Prime Day is back, and the two-day sales blitz starting Tuesday brings more than deals on big-screen TVs and vacuum cleaners. A new Senate investigation finds that Prime Day also results in a slew of warehouse injuries among Amazon workers, reports the Washington Post . The yearlong review by the...

FDIC Chairman to Resign After Workplace Culture Accusations

More than 500 employees reported sexual harassment, racism, sexism, bullying, you name it

(Newser) - The chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. announced Monday that he's leaving in response to an independent review's findings that the independent agency is rife with sexual harassment and discrimination. Martin Gruenberg said he'll resign once a successor is confirmed, CNBC reports, and a White House...

Workers Are Cheating on Drug Tests Like Never Before
Workers Are Cheating on
Drug Tests Like Never Before
the rundown

Workers Are Cheating on Drug Tests Like Never Before

Quest Diagnostics describes 633% spike in swapped tests in 2023

(Newser) - Most of the millions of drug screens performed in the US each year come back negative. A small but growing fraction, however, come back positive. And a rapidly increasing number show signs of tampering. Indeed, US workers are cheating on drug tests at the highest rate in decades, according to...

Sanitation Firm Fined $650K for Hiring Kids to Clean Factories

Fayette Janitorial Service has also agreed to no longer hire minors to work in meatpacking plants

(Newser) - A Tennessee-based sanitation company has agreed to pay more than half a million dollars after a federal investigation found it illegally hired at least two dozen children to clean dangerous meat-processing facilities in Iowa and Virginia. The US Department of Labor announced Monday that Fayette Janitorial Service LLC entered into...

These Pregnancy Rules Could Upend the Workplace

New regulations offer guidance on morning sickness, doctor appointments, abortion, and more

(Newser) - Pregnant employees have the right to a wide range of accommodations under new federal regulations for enforcing the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act that supporters say could change workplace culture for millions of people. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the agency in charge of enforcing the law, adopted an expansive view...

Why Don't We Talk About Carpal Tunnel Anymore?

The Atlantic takes a look at a white collar epidemic that fizzled out

(Newser) - If you are reading this from a standing desk while wearing blue light glasses, chances are you've heard of the dangers associated with spending long stretches of time on devices. Whether or not you heed those warnings, there was a time when you couldn't escape think pieces examining...

Report: At Musk's SpaceX, Hundreds of Hidden Injuries

Reuters details amputations, crushed limbs, even a death in rush to send humans to Mars

(Newser) - Elon Musk has long been eager to get humans to Mars ASAP—maybe too eager, according to a new Reuters' documentation of injuries at SpaceX facilities over the past decade. The news agency conducted interviews and sifted through government files to reveal how many SpaceX workplace injuries, all previously unreported,...

More Americans Testing Positive for Pot at Work

Quest Diagnostics survey puts the figure at 4.3%

(Newser) - More Americans than ever have access to legal marijuana, and they're apparently using it more on the job. An annual analysis by the medical lab Quest Diagnostics finds that 4.3% of US workers tested positive for marijuana last year, the highest figure since the company began tracking it...

US Steps Up Dollar General's Workplace Safety Punishment

OSHA puts 'severe violator' label on chain, which allows random inspections

(Newser) - Inspectors have found 111 workplace safety violations in visits to more than 270 Dollar General stores since January 2017. In that time, the company has been fined more than $15.5 million by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. That record has landed the retailer in the agency's Severe...

Workplace Discovery Solves Missing Man's Disappearance

Alex Gordon fell into industrial shredder at South Carolina plant weeks ago

(Newser) - A 20-year-old employee at a recycling plant in South Carolina seemed to vanish without a trace in May. Now, the coroner in Spartanburg County has solved the mystery: Alex Gordon fell into a giant plastic shredder at the Industrial Recycling and Recovery plant in Greer, reports the State . The revelation...

Batwoman Star Accuses Show of Misconduct

Warner Bros. TV argues Ruby Rose was the problem

(Newser) - The original star of TV's Batwoman accused the show's network and studio on Wednesday of running an abusive and dangerous workplace that drove her from the program. Ruby Rose listed a series of injuries and accusations, Rolling Stone reports, which Warner Bros. TV argued in a statement later...

Every McDonald's in This Nation Shuttered for 2 Days

After 2 teen employees were electrocuted in Lima, Peru

(Newser) - Every McDonald's in Peru shut down for two days this week to mourn two teen workers who died while working a night shift over the weekend. The bodies of 18-year-old Gabriel Campos Zapata and Alexandra Porras Inga, 19, were found by emergency workers in the Lima restaurant Sunday morning....

How One State 'Scuttled' an Amazon Worker's Death
Why One State 'Scuttled'
Worker's Horrible Death
longform

Why One State 'Scuttled' Worker's Horrible Death

Phillip Lee Terry died in Indiana in 2017

(Newser) - Phillip Lee Terry's death was needless and gruesome. Now Indiana officials are accused of crippling a probe into the tragedy while trying to get Amazon to open its second headquarters in the state, Vice reports. John Stallone, a former state safety inspector, is the whistleblower who triggered the story....

Worker's Comp Awarded After Death During Illicit Sex
He Had Sex on
a Business Trip
and Died. His
Employer Is Liable
in case you missed it

He Had Sex on a Business Trip and Died. His Employer Is Liable

Paris court rules cardiac arrest during adulterous interlude was a workplace accident

(Newser) - An employee for a French railway company went into cardiac arrest and died during an adulterous sexual encounter with a "perfect stranger" while on an out-of-town assignment for work, and a Paris court recently deemed it a workplace accident and is holding the employer liable. Quartz reports on the...

A Noise From Meat Grinder, Then a Horrifying Scene

Worker killed Monday in Pennsylvania meat-processing facility

(Newser) - "This was a horrible accident" seems an understatement considering how a plant worker died Monday in Pennsylvania. Lycoming County Coroner Charles E. Kiessling Jr. said 35-year-old Jill Greninger fell or was pulled to her death inside a large commercial meat grinder she was operating at Economy Locker Storage Co....

Bear Spray Incident Sends Amazon Workers to Hospital

9-ounce bottle of spray was accidentally punctured

(Newser) - Amazon sells everything, including bear spray, a fact that made for a pretty rough workday for some employees at an Amazon fulfillment center in Robbinsville, NJ. ABC News reports bear repellent spray was accidentally released on the third floor of the 1.3 million-square foot facility, sending 24 workers to...

Older Workers Dying on the Job at a Higher Rate

35% of fatal accidents involved a worker over 55

(Newser) - Older people are dying on the job at a higher rate than workers overall, even as the rate of workplace fatalities decreases, according to an AP analysis of federal statistics. It's a trend that's particularly alarming as baby boomers reject the traditional retirement age of 65 and keep...

Firm Cited for 23 Violations After Robot Kills Bride-to-Be

Auto parts plant cut safety corners to meet high targets: OSHA

(Newser) - Federal authorities have announced nearly two dozen safety violations issued to an auto parts manufacturer after a bride-to-be who worked at its Alabama plant was crushed to death by a robotic machine. The US Occupational Safety and Health Administration on Wednesday announced 23 violations after investigating the death at the...

Soon-to-Be-Dad Dies in Molasses Vat at Work

Robert Herweyer had just married and was expecting his first child

(Newser) - Robert Herweyer had much to look forward to. The 23-year-old had married in November, just moved into a new home with wife Joy, and was expecting his first child with her any day now. But a tragic accident cut all that short when the Michigan man died in a molasses...

US Poultry Workers Wear Diapers: Report
 US Poultry 
 Workers Wear 
 Diapers: Report 
in case you missed it

US Poultry Workers Wear Diapers: Report

Denial of bathroom breaks a serious safety issue, affront to human dignity: Oxfam

(Newser) - On the Pilgrim's Pride website , "prioritize the team over yourself" is one of the poultry producer's core values. But in something out of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle , Bloomberg notes, an Oxfam America report suggests that "value" is really a humiliating issue for already marginalized workers...

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