While OSHA can be a bit onerous it really does help to have an organization with teeth pushing safety culture. Instead of the conflict between the workers and t

While OSHA can be a bit onerous it really does help to have an organization with teeth pushing safety culture. Instead of the conflict between the workers and their bosses 'stupid rules' it's the 'stupid rules' of some 3rd party. OSHA standards are quite a low bar in general. An organization that is simply "OSHA compliant" is definitely not taking safety seriously. Moreover, OSHA is often far down the list of regulatory agencies that companies are worried about. For example, killing a protected bird species is far more likely to incur 6-7 figure fines and/or land management in prison than a workplace fatality. That said, the situation with OSHA isn't particularly concerning. Most major companies are aggressively safety oriented. Even ignoring the legal liabilities of injured workers the fact is that, in the long term, unsafe working conditions are often less productive and potentially extremely damaging to capital investments. To illustrate, an accident at an oil refinery could easily run into the hundreds of millions in damage, in addition to an equal if not greater amount in lost production. The costs of settling lawsuits and/or fines for safety violations are trivial by comparison. Nowadays, the greatest risks to U.S. labor is not from the likes of Kiewit, Union Pacific, Rio Tinto, etc. It is the small and under capitalized businesses. So, what can be done? Such businesses are already walking on a financial tightrope. If OSHA were to properly scrutinize such businesses even their limited fines would present a significant stress. Some people might retort that if a business can't operate safely than it shouldn't be operating at all, which is a fine. The downside is that all of those services will become substantially less competitive and more expensive.