Starbucks Union

Jdimytai "Jimbo" Damour took a temp job for the Christmas rush at the Walmart in Green Acres Mall on Long Island. Some rush. When a crowd of bargain hunters pushed into the store at 5 am on "Black Friday," Damour, a 34 year old who weighed 270 pounds, fell to the floor and was trampled. He died within an hour...

Cavalcade of Risk #66 is posted at Political Calculations, where the blogger who goes under the alias of Ironman takes an innovative approach by offering two editions with all posts presented in a grid-like format, applying a blog post rating system. See Investment Grade and Kit and Caboodle versions for this week's entries. State cost variations - Risk & Insurance...

For many of us, Amityville NY brings to mind a book (and movie) called the Amityville Horror, which tell the story of an innocent couple moving into a house whose prior inhabitants had been murdered. The house is haunted by the ghosts of the deceased. If the story were to happen again, the house would surely be cleaned by Icon...

Dollar Tree is a national company with stores in all 48 states. Everything they offer costs a buck. (They are doing very nicely in this recession.) Here's how they describe themselves: Walk into one of our stores and it hits you immediately: this is a place where shopping is fun. We call it "Thrill of the Hunt". We have worked...

Last week, North Carolina's Occupational Safety and Health division levied 49 citations and $178,000 in fines for workplace hazards on the House of Raeford Farms, one of nation's largest poultry processors. This action was taken in response to serious, repeat safety violations, many involving hazardous chemicals that pose a threat to the safety of both the plant workers and the...

There are a number of ways to purchase workers comp insurance: most companies secure stand-alone policies. Under experience rating, if the company has losses, their costs go up; if they have lower than average losses, they benefit from reduced premiums. Some companies join with others to form a self-insurance group (SIG), where individual companies are no longer in charge of...

Joe Paduda is hosting the post-election edition of Cavalcade of Risk. Dedicated blogger that he is, his post comes to us from Las Vegas, where he offers observations from the floor of the National Workers Comp and Disability Conference. Joe has been a roving workers comp reporter lately. His recent trip follows on the heels of his reports from the...

There is a fascinating article in today's Wall Street Journal (subscription required) that raises interesting implications for workers compensation. Melinda Beck writes that warning labels on medications can actually stimulate symptoms, especially when stress is involved. In other words, when an injured employee reads a warning label - "this medicine may cause vomiting, headaches, drowsiness, etc" - he or she...

Florida employers have seen about a 60% rate decrease since the 2003 workers compensation reform but it looks like all that is about to change. NCCI has just filed for an 8.9% Florida rate increase in the wake of a recent Florida Supreme Court ruling. This is an enormous change, particularly in light of the 18.9 percent decrease that had...

There must be something in the smoke: a few months ago we blogged the tale of Albert Arroyo, a Boston firefighter who participated in a body building contest while collecting workers comp for an alleged disability. Well, to demonstrate that we harbor neither geographic nor gender prejudices, we tell the tale of Christina Hijjawi, a 37 year-old firefighter from San...

Louise has posted "The Election Is Over" edition of Health Wonk Review at Colorado Health Insurance Insider. Now that voters have made their choices and the dust is settling, many wonkers are opining about how health care reform is likely to take shape. Also of note: various posts discuss the ways that advanced technologies are increasing the cost of health...

Here are two items you might never expect to appear together: frozen embryos and workers comp. But a case in Arkansas reveals that the comp system can easily be drawn into the ongoing (and apparently endless) debate of when life begins. Wade and Amy Finley were married in 1990. They were unsuccessful in having children, so in 2000 they initiated...

Because AIG has been at the epicenter of the economic earthquake, many non-industry observers point to insurance as one of the villains and the industry is getting a black eye that may not be warranted. AIG's problems did not surface in its insurance operations, which remained sound, but with their dubious investment portfolio which rocked the entire organization. Not that...

Cavalcade of Risk #64 is posted and awaiting your perusal at SuperSaver. OSHA - three new safety bulletins are available from OSHA: Compactor Rollover Hazard Hazards of Transporting, Unloading, Storing and Handling Granite,Marble and Stone Slabs Hazards of Using Flammable Liquids in Cutting Laminated Glass Violence at work not always compensable - Roberto Ceniceros of Business Insurance reports on an...

If you are an employer with operations in multiple states or if you are just plain curious about how your state's workers' comp costs stack up to other states, we have just the tool for you. The Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services has just released its biennial report on state rankings for workers' compensation premium rates (PDF). The...

David Harlow of HealthBlawg has posted the Samhain edition of Health Wonk Review. If you are like me and don't know what Samhain refers to, go and get yourself educumated - it's interesting! As are all the entries in this last-call edition for health policy posts before the upcoming election. David is one of our long-time participants in the biweekly...

Cleaning out our bookmark files, we came upon an assortment of health and safety resources that we thought we'd pass along. You may face some unusual hazards on your job, but it is unlikely you face anything like this - yikes. We've mentioned the Naval Safety Center's Photos of the Week - well worth checking out if you haven't. Each...

Last month we blogged the emerging scandal involving the Long Island Railroad, where over 90 percent of employees (management included) retire on disability. Walt Bodanich and Duff Wilson of the New York Times have a follow up article that goes into some of the deails. It's not surprising to find that workers were coached in the best way to apply...

Emma Murray was a certified nursing assistant for Mariner Health Care in Florida. While helping to lift a patient, she suffered a uterine prolapse, which required a hysterectomy. She filed for workers comp, but her claim was denied because the carrier determined that the condition was not work related. Murray appealed. Based upon a favorable independent medical exam, she prevailed....

We are all struggling to keep our bearings in a world where the conventional compass is spinning madly. The economic crisis has sent the stock market plummeting and has impacted every aspect of our lives. We wake up with the same thoughts that Alice had, following her fall down the rabbit hole: I wonder if I've been changed in the...