OSHA requires that employers provide a safe workplace. Has this been vacated?

[nature-lover]

The OSHA general duty clause, Section 5(a)(1) of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, requires that each employer furnish to each of its employees a workplace that is free from recognized hazards that are causing or likely to cause death or serious physical harm.

From OSHA.gov/workers/

Under federal law, you are entitled to a safe workplace. Your employer must provide a workplace free of known health and safety hazards. If you have concerns, you have the right to speak up about them without fear of retaliation. You also have the right to:

Be trained in a language you understand
Work on machines that are safe
Be provided required safety gear, such as gloves or a harness and lifeline for falls
Be protected from toxic chemicals
Request an OSHA inspection, and speak to the inspector
Report an injury or illness, and get copies of your medical records
See copies of the workplace injury and illness log
Review records of work-related injuries and illnesses
Get copies of test results done to find hazards in the workplace

[Fullduplexxx]

1. Im sure if it is dewine will ignore it, shop for a lawyer to give him a legal ok or just legislate

It away

[Newest Reality]

2. Did you get the memo?

The new Republican stance firmly states that laws were made to be broken.

[Chainfire]

3. OSHA was gutted by Republicans

many years ago. They are a toothless tiger.

Starting out in the construction industry in the early 1970s I saw the rise and fall of OSHA.

[sinkingfeeling]

4. There are no laws anymore.

[JudyM]

5. Interesting question.

As long as an employer follows all the governor’s express operational guidance (e.g., distancing), the employer could be deemed in compliance, for liability purposes, as a general rule. Being part of the Exec branch, OSHA will likely bow to trump and decline enforcement even if its standards are being violated as a practical matter.

Could OSHA be sued to enforce its rules if they conflict with a governor’s orders? OSHA standards should control in the situation of more lax state standards. It’d be similar to lawsuits seeking to force EPA to enforce its rules. Which trump is decimating.

The state-level OSHA depts likely have rules that would prohibit these too-early-to-be-safe openings, as well, but again, they’d bow to their executive’s decision. Everyone out of compliance, certainly, with at least the spirit (and likely administrative case law) of these regs.