Workplace Health and Safety

Workplace injuries and illnesses shorten and reduce the quality of lives and create a significant drain on economic productivity. For more than 20 years RAND has used its objective and uniquely multi-disciplinary approach to develop effective strategies for targeting scarce prevention resources and providing compensation and healthcare for injured workers.

Our research has focused on topics such as:

Current and past clients include the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), California's Division of Workers' Compensation, and the Nanotechnology Research Center.

Featured Research

Understanding Risks in the Workplace

• Cost–Benefit Analysis of Proposed California Oil and Gas Refinery Regulations

  Daniel Gonzales, Timothy R. Gulden, Aaron Strong, William Hoyle

  New safety standards for oil and gas refineries in California might reduce refinery incidents, providing benefits to the public and savings to California consumers. To be worth the cost, the rules would have to produce modest improvements in safety.

• Is Occupational Injury Risk Higher at New Firms?

  Seth A. Seabury, John Mendeloff, Frank W. Neuhauser

  This paper studies whether newly created firms have higher injury rates than established firms.

• States with Low Non-Fatal Injury Rates Have High Fatality Rates and Vice-Versa

  John Mendeloff, Rachel M. Burns

  This paper uses a measure of severe injuries (fatalities) and of less severe injuries (non-fatal injuries with days away from work, restricted work, or job transfer–DART) to examine that issue.

• Are Small Businesses Riskier Than Larger Ones?

  John Mendeloff, Christopher Nelson, Kilkon Ko, Amelia Haviland

  This research brief summarizes research that provides a more complete picture of fatality risks found at both smaller establishments and smaller firms, to help inform effective policies toward small businesses.

Assessing and Improving Program Effectiveness

• Understanding the Economic Benefit Associated with Research and Services at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health: An Approach and Three Case Studies

  Benjamin M. Miller, David Metz, Troy D. Smith, Jesse Lastunen, Eric Landree, Christopher Nelson

  The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) asked the RAND Corporation to develop an approach for estimating the economic benefit of NIOSH research, using three case studies. A new report details findings and recommendations.

• Helping Research Programs Demonstrate Impact

  Valerie L. Williams, Elisa Eiseman, Eric Landree, David M. Adamson

  RAND researchers used logic models, outcome worksheets, and outcome narratives to help the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health demonstrate and communicate the impact of its research.

• Are There Unusually Effective Occupational Safety and Health Inspectors and Inspection Practices?

  Amelia Haviland, Regan Main, Wayne B. Gray, Jing Xia, John Mendeloff

  Examines the role of inspector style in influencing the effectiveness of inspections in reducing injury rates.

Assessing the Adequacy of Workers' Compensation Benefits

• Industrial Cancers in California's Workers' Compensation System: Evidence on Earnings Losses and Disability Benefits

  Michael Dworsky, Carolyn M. Rutter

  In this report, the authors conduct an empirical analysis of earnings losses, disability ratings, and benefit payments for occupational cancer claims in the California workers' compensation system.

• How Can Workers' Compensation Systems Promote Occupational Safety and Health? Stakeholder Views on Policy and Research Priorities

  Michael Dworsky, Nicholas Broten

  A report from RAND explores the views of key workers' compensation stakeholders. The study presents challenges and priorities to be addressed in reforming workers' compensation systems to promote occupational safety and the well-being of workers.

• Benefits and Earnings Losses for Permanently Disabled Workers in California: Trends Through the Great Recession and Effects of Recent Reforms

  Michael Dworsky, Seth A. Seabury, Frank W. Neuhauser, Ujwal Kharel, Roald Euller

  Following California's major reforms to the state workers' compensation system, RAND researchers assess trends in earnings loss and permanent partial disability benefits before the reforms, as well as how the reforms might affect injury compensation.

• California's 2012 Workers' Compensation Reforms Helped Replace Wages and Offset Earnings Losses After the Great Recession

  Michael Dworsky, Seth A. Seabury, Frank W. Neuhauser, Ujwal Kharel, Roald Euller

  Workers' compensation reforms (Senate Bill 863) have likely increased wage replacement rates for permanently disabled Californians by 21.4 percentage points since 2012. The bill is helping to offset the recession's lasting effects on earnings losses.

Improving the Quality and Efficiency of Healthcare for Injured Workers

• Medical Care Provided to California's Injured Workers: Monitoring System Performance Using Administrative Data

  Barbara O. Wynn, Andrew W. Mulcahy, Harry H. Liu, Rosalie Malsberger, Edward N. Okeke

  This report provides a framework for understanding changes in medical spending levels and provides the results from RAND's analysis of Workers' Compensation Information System data for 2007--2012.

• Modeling the Economic Impact of a California Workers' Compensation Formulary

  Andrew W. Mulcahy, Simon Hollands, Erin Lindsey Duffy, Aaron Strong, Barbara O. Wynn

  This report estimates the potential impacts of a California Workers' Compensation formulary in terms of changes in prescription drug use and spending and discusses the potential broader impacts of these changes on the California economy.

• Technical Quality and Clinical Acceptability of a Utilization Review Guideline for Occupational Conditions: ODG® Treatment Guidelines by the Work Loss Data Institute

  Teryl K. Nuckols, Kanaka Shetty, Laura Raaen, Dmitry Khodyakov

  The Official Disability Guidelines (ODG) Medical Treatment Guidelines is a utilization review guideline used in the field of workers' compensation. This report evaluates the ODG's technical quality and clinical acceptability.

• Implementing a Drug Formulary for California's Workers' Compensation Program

  Barbara O. Wynn, Christine Buttorff, Erika Meza, Erin Audrey Taylor, Andrew W. Mulcahy

  This report supports the California Division of Workers' Compensation's efforts to establish a drug formulary by comparing existing workers' compensation formularies and analyzing options for designing and implementing the formulary.

• Home Health Care for California's Injured Workers: Options for Implementing a Fee Schedule

  Barbara O. Wynn, Anne E. Boustead

  The California Department of Industrial Relations/Division of Worker's Compensation asked RAND to help develop a fee schedule for home health services provided to injured workers. The researchers made three sets of recommendations.

Understanding the Impact of New Trends and Policies on Worker Safety, Care, and Compensation

• How Does Expanding Health Insurance Coverage Affect Workers' Compensation Costs?

  Philip Armour, Prodyumna Goutam, Paul Heaton

  The Affordable Care Act's expansion of coverage for people under age 26 led to a 1-percent reduction in uninsurance, equating to a 0.8-percent decrease in workers' compensation claim frequency, and a roughly 1-percent decrease in overall claim costs.

• Nanomaterials in the Workplace: Policy and Planning Workshop on Occupational Safety and Health

  James T. Bartis, Eric Landree

  Places workshop discussions on protecting the safety and health of workers exposed to nanoscale materials within a policy framework for consideration by NIOSH.

Improving the Safety of First-Responders

• The Frequency and Economic Impact of Musculoskeletal Disorders for California Firefighters: Trends and Outcomes over the Past Decade

  Michael Dworsky, Seth A. Seabury, Nicholas Broten

  The authors update analyses from a 2010 study on firefighters in California and consider the impacts of the 2013 workers' compensation reforms and the economic shocks of the late 2000s on outcomes for firefighters with musculoskeletal disorders.

• Risk Factors for Injury in Law Enforcement Officer Vehicle Crashes

  Tom LaTourrette

  The purpose of this paper is to identify risk factors for injury in police officer vehicle crashes in order to help determine the most effective approaches to improve officer vehicle safety.

• Occupational Safety and Health for Public Safety Employees: Assessing the Evidence and the Implications for Public Policy

  Tom LaTourrette, David S. Loughran, Seth A. Seabury

  Examines the safety and health risks faced by police officers, firefighters, and other public safety workers and how they differ from those faced by the general workforce.

• Protecting Emergency Responders, Volume 4: Personal Protective Equipment Guidelines for Structural Collapse Events

  Henry H. Willis, Nicholas G. Castle, Elizabeth M. Sloss, James T. Bartis

  Serves as a technical source for National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) incident commander guidelines for emergency response immediately following large structural collapse events.

• Emergency Responder Injuries and Fatalities: An Analysis of Surveillance Data

  Ari Houser, Brian A. Jackson, James T. Bartis, D. J. Peterson

  Summarizes the results of an analysis of available data sources concerning the hazards facing firefighters, police, and emergency medical responders.