Monday September 19, 2022; 9:47 AM EDT
- On May 1, 2014, I posted this comment beneath a New York Times op-ed piece about workplace safety regulations, written by Nicholas Kristof, called "Job Crushing or Lifesaving?"#
- My brother died at work twenty years ago, when he was in his early thirties, leaving a wife and small children. He was working on an electric line on a utility pole in a suburban neighborhood and he was electrocuted.#
- Some months later a person from OSHA came to my parents with the accident report. Speaking of workplace safety, he told my father, "Every one of the regulations is written in someone's blood."#
- About a year later, another lineman from the same Midwestern electric company was electrocuted at work. On the evening news, a reporter asked the company's representative if these kinds of accidents happened frequently and how long it had been since the last one. The company man said that they were very rare and that he couldn't remember when the last one took place. The reporter didn't know enough to push back against that phony, self-serving answer. Episodes like this show me how much we need strong regulatory agencies, skillful watchdog journalists, and activist citizens groups, and we always will. #
- We didn't swear much in the house. As that bit of news aired on the tv, my father and I watched from chair and sofa there in the living room. We looked at each other, but we did not speak. I wish we had spoken. I remember not just of the return of grief but something quietly seething. I think what the look meant was, "That's such bullshit."#
- This week my brother's son and his wife welcomed a child together into the world, a daughter who would have been my brother's first grandchild. He would have been in his very early sixties.#