“For vulnerable workers where retaliation is rampant and getting blacklisted is rampant, folks who get injured tend to either deal with it on their own or ignore it,” said Jessica Martinez, co-executive director at the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health.

The worker death rate across all industries was 3.6 per 100,000, the highest since 2016.

Jessica Martinez, co-executive director for the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health, released a statement calling the death rate for all industries “unacceptably high,” and advocating for reform.

“We need an urgent wake-up call to our employers and our government,” Martinez said in the statement. “Listen to workers. Enforce our safety laws. Remove known hazards, and let’s work together to make sure every worker comes home safely at the end of every shift.”

El Comité committee is sponsored by the Coalition for Restaurant Health and Safety (CRSH) and 215 People’s Alliance. CRSH has been supported by PhilaPOSH, a labor and community-based organization with a long track record of advocating for safer workplaces. PhilaPOSH is an affiliate of my organization, the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH).

The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health listed Dollar General as one of the “dirty dozen” employers earlier this year.

“Dollar General has shown a pattern of alarmingly willful disregard for federal safety standards, choosing to place profits over their employees’ safety and well-being,” said Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health Doug Parker in the November news release. 

“We know they don’t treat us right, it’s not safe most of the time,” said Eh Phaung, a forklift operator at a mattress factory near Albany, New York. She attended the Summit with National COSH affiliate NENYCOSH, and said she and her co-workers face hazards from long hours and repetitive carrying and heavy lifting.

National COSH and allies in the movement for workplace justice worked together prior to the Summit and advocated strongly for an inclusive, accessible event to genuinely represent and uplift the voices of workers who face dangerous, life-threatening hazards every day on the job. Collaborating with our COSH Network of 26 local health and safety groups, we reached out to engage workers whose voices are overlooked: Low-wage workers, temp workers, immigrants and workers of color.

Through its WorkedUp initiative, which seeks to bring together worker organizations to support and amplify each other’s struggles, National COSH is running a petition on behalf of the factory workers as they continue negotiations with Refresco.

“Companies like Refresco have big PR firms to do their dirty work for them, but what do workers have? That’s why, with the support of unions and worker centers from all over the country, National COSH created WorkedUp. It gives workers a place where they can document workplace injustices and tell the public how they’re overworked, underpaid, and underprotected,” said COSH’s Melissa Moriarty, a storytelling and communications strategist. 

“When workers are sitting at the table, providing input into the program, that’s when you have a workforce that is engaged and has a buy-in into the safety program,” said Jessica Martinez, co-executive director of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health. “I could never sit down and say I know what the job of a construction worker is. When you ask them, ‘What are the issues at your worksite and how can we come to a solution?’ you have workers who are more engaged. They feel empowered to use their voice.”

What do a group of factory workers in New Jersey and domestic cleaners in Manhattan share with dairy and poultry workers all across rural America? They know their workplace stories have power, and they’re using WorkedUp, a collective storytelling campaign, to organize and make change happen.

WorkedUp makes it easy for hardworking people to document what happens in the workplace via YouTube videos and written testimonials. The simple yet powerful resource was started by the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) — a W.K. Kellogg Foundation grantee — through its 26 local and state affiliates. 

In workplace settings, fatigue is commonly associated with nonstandard schedules, like night shift work and extended work hours, which can often disrupt or shorten sleep. High levels of fatigue can affect any worker in any occupation or industry with serious consequences for worker safety and health.

The TWH approach emphasizes the fundamental role that high-quality work and healthy work design play in safer, healthier workers. This article features a discussion about the impact of overtime and long work hours with Marnie Dobson, PhD, Director of the Healthy Work Campaign, and Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, MS, Co-Executive Director of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health.

That’s just one of the preventable hazards faced by workers processing the meats we’ll be sizzling on our grills this weekend. Several of her co-workers, Marielena reports, “hurt themselves lifting because the floors were wet. There were chemicals; they have cuts and the velocity [of the line] is so fast [but] the supervisor comes and yells at us to move faster.”

Marielena tells her story at WorkedUp, a new platform hosted by the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health, where we are co-executive directors. WorkedUp highlights testimony from workers standing up for better work conditions. But she prefers not to use her real name due to the very real threat of employer retaliation. 

Peter Dooley, a safety and health senior project coordinator for the National Council of Occupational Safety and Health, said the additional commenting period gives time to ensure OSHA makes the right decision.

“Revoking a state plan would be an unprecedented action by OSHA,” Dooley said in a statement. “It makes sense for OSHA to take the time to review all the evidence and get this right, because having Arizona DOSH underperform lowers the bar for the rest of the country – and all workers are paying the price.”

More than a year since President Joe Biden took office, NCOSH has pushed for greater enforcement of workplace safety laws. In 2021, NCOSH leaders criticized OSHA for failing to keep workers safe during the pandemic. In its June letter, the organization also cited a “lack of consistent and aggressive enforcement of existing safety laws” that could prevent hazards such as falls and trench collapses.

Janine Denise Johnson Williams, 50, was one of nine workers who died this past December when a tornado struck Mayfield Consumer Products in Kentucky. She is survived by her husband, four children and 17 grandchildren. Five workers at the Mayfield plant say they asked to leave after severe weather alerts but were told to stay or risk being fired.

These three preventable deaths are just a few of those that took place at workplaces recognized as this year’s Dirty Dozen unsafe employers by our organization, the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH). Each year we release this list to call attention to egregious actions by companies that put workers and communities at risk.

But in today’s labor market, where employers are dealing with a shortage of workers, the old tricks aren’t working. Workers are standing up to intimidation with bold campaigns at companies like Starbucks, Amazon and Dollar General. Stories from these workplaces and others can be found on workedup.us, a new National COSH platform for workers who are joining together to turn bad jobs into good jobs and good jobs into better ones.

Janine Denise Johnson Williams, 50, was one of nine workers who died this past December when a tornado struck Mayfield Consumer Products in Kentucky. She is survived by her husband, four children and 17 grandchildren. Five workers at the Mayfield plant say they asked to leave after severe weather alerts but were told to stay or risk being fired. 

These three preventable deaths are just a few of those that took place at workplaces recognized as this year’s Dirty Dozen unsafe employers by our organization, the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health. Each year we release this list to call attention to egregious actions by companies who put workers and communities at risk. 

For the third time this year, Amazon was singled out by the National Occupational Safety and Health Council for its grueling warehouse labor practices and having an injury rate more than double the industry average. Limiting productivity quotas prevents workers from abiding by questionable safety standards and can "ease the bargaining process" when making workplace health claims, Senator Ramos explains in a statement. If the bill is passed, companies would be required to go through an extensive assessment of all conditions and tasks, and face penalties if they fall short in safety standards.

Released in honor of Workers’ Memorial Week, National COSH’s “Dirty Dozen” report is an annual list of “egregious” employers, all of whom are accused of exposing their workers to preventable hazards. Companies are selected based on their prominence and the degree to which they allegedly endangered their employees. This year, nearly half of the companies on National COSH’s list are involved in farming or the food industry, and the report highlights serious labor violations throughout the supply chain.

If you are unaware of the workings of COSH or more commonly known as Council for Occupational Safety and Health, then worry not, as they are a national advocacy group regulating and monitoring working conditions in numerous organizations. Their list Dirty Dozen now includes Amazon. While the massive package delivery platform has to say otherwise, the facts and figures prove that they deserve to be on the list, if not at the very top.

The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health named Starbucks, Amazon, Dollar General and nine other companies in the organization's "dirty dozen" report released Wednesday, which labels 12 businesses it says.

Yesterday, the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH) announced this year’s “dirty dozen” employers, companies who have unsafe work practices.

According to National COSH, in 2020, more than 4,700 workers died because of workplace incidents. It estimates that more than 95,000 workers die every year from long-term exposure to hazards and toxins.

National COSH announced this during Workers’ Memorial Week, a week to remember those who lost their lives on the job, and one day before Workers’ Memorial Day.