4 ms·
Micro-injuries every day. Pulled muscles. Sprains. Tendon and ligament tears. Vertebra damage from lifting too fast or incorrectly. Falls. These are usuall
by dreamcompiler 3y ago
Micro-injuries every day.
Pulled muscles.
Sprains.
Tendon and ligament tears.
Vertebra damage from lifting too fast or incorrectly.
Falls. These are usually life altering.
Not using PPE because it takes too long or impedes your vision or it causes you to sweat more or you just don't want the rest of the crew to call you a pussy.
Hearing damage (because no PPE).
Cuts and bruises because you didn't wear gloves.
Sunburn every day which means skin cancer is guaranteed eventually.
Long term exposure to stuff like concrete dust, fiberglas insulation, sawdust from treated wood, volatile organics etc which can wreck your lungs.
Poor nutrition because of too-short lunch breaks and unavailability of non-processed food.
Getting ripped apart by heavy powered equipment because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time and somebody did something stupid. Again, life altering.
Frequent alcohol use to ease the aches and pains built up during the day.
But mostly just hard damn physical activity in brutal conditions 8-12 hours a day. Do this for 20 years and it ages you fast and wears out your body.
This is not exercise at the indoor gym with safe equipment under the supervision of a coach. This is "get your ass up that ladder with 100 lbs of shingles on your shoulder without a stinking safety rope and fast, or you're fired."
What about OSHA? OSHA on construction sites is not really a thing I've seen, and if anybody mentioned an OSHA violation they would probably be fired. And since much of the labor force is undocumented, they ain't gonna report a violation anyway, lest they get discovered and deported.
- justinclift 3y agoSounds like chronic toxic employers then?
- delfinom 3y agoYea, the construction and trades industry has a lot of toxic employers, you know, middle aged or older "manly man" syndrome individuals. They are shocked that younger people don't want to join the trades and experience shit pay and daily hazing until they become a real tradesman. There are good employers out there but they are far and few between. Union jobs are also decentish but also not common outside a few places.
- tennisflyi 3y agoYes. That’s every employeer outside of kush tech jobs. Again, most people don’t get anything close to Herman Miller chairs and UPLIFT desk.
- justinclift 3y agoHate to break it to you but in most western countries all the non exec employees in an office building get the same chairs. Probably the only ones with Herman Miller and other expensive chairs are the receptionists. ;)
- greedo 3y agoThe financial services company I work for employs 5k people. Everyone has HM chairs.
- morkalork 3y agoIn healthcare and there's very explicit rules about how one is to approach, lift and transfer or roll patients, who weigh more than the staff attending to them. Even including a count of staff-per-weight ratio. Sadly, I imagine if one took the same precautions in construction, you'd be told to hurry tf up and you're on your own.
- thaeli 3y agoCompare this to EMS, where unless you're lucky enough to be fire or hospital based, worker protections are almost nonexistent.
- dendrite9 3y agoAnd even there workers get hurt and are pressured to do some tasks with less assistance. Unfortunately it isn't hard to do just a little bit too much and get hurt.
- zer8k 3y agoI know several healthcare professionals with permanently screwed up backs because a patient was falling and they went to catch the patient. Much like an I-beam falling on you, you don't always get to pick and choose what you have to deal with. I asked a couple nurses I know and they have never heard of this "staff-to-weight" ratio. At least here in America most hospitals operate on staff-to-patient ratio. I suppose this could be different in other countries.
- fbdab103 3y agoTexas just nullified a law which required 10 minute breaks for construction workers every 4 hours[0]. I do not even do back breaking labor in the sun and I take significantly more breaks throughout the day. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/23/greg-abbott-texas-governor-bill-water-breaks-heatwave https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/23/greg-abbott-...
- bluGill 3y agoI suspect most construction companies will ensure their workers get plenty of water. If only because people who drink enough water on hot days get a lot more done in the day.
- maxerickson 3y agoI agree with you that incentives are aligned and disagree that this means that the companies will actually do the smart thing.
- creato 3y agoThis law means nothing in practice. If you are working construction in the Texas heat, you need to drink water every 10-30 minutes, not just once every 4 hours. I can't imagine an employer lasting long if they didn't allow their employees to drink water when needed (and visit the portapotty accordingly). When I worked construction in the summer in a place nowhere near as hot as Texas, I drank 1-2 gallons of water a day, and it wasn't just on a few legally mandated breaks.
- bluGill 3y agoEvery construction site I've seen has a water cooler and the people are allowed to take a drink every time they walk by. Either that or the people all come to work with their own water which they bring with them all day to drink when they want. Nobody cares about the few seconds lost to someone having a drink.