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The Allen County Board of Commissioners cannot be held liable for a former county court employee’s disability claims because the board was neither his direct nor indirect employer, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled. In Carleton Harris v. Allen County Board of Commissioners, 17-2577, Carleton Harris began working at the Allen County Juvenile Center in 1995, and his…

Doug Jameson doesn’t need a study to tell him what he already knows about the depressing state of business in Illinois. “I’m looking around downtown Belleville right now and I can see five for-sale signs plastered across what were once business operations,” Jameson told the Metro East Sun. “Businesses don’t want to locate here and the ones that are still…

The average total cost per workers’ compensation claim in Indiana was stable in the years since the state enacted workers’ comp system reforms, according to a recent Workers Compensation Research Institute study. The study, CompScope Benchmarks for Indiana, 18th Edition, provides a look at changes in the Indiana workers’ comp system following the enactment in 2013 of House Enrolled Act…

Editor’s Note: This column was written by the following doctors: Avi Bernstein, Asokumar Buvanendran, David Fletcher, David Kanzler, Richard Kube, Steven Mardjetko, Brian Murphy, Michael Vender, Mike Zindrick There’s a crisis looming in our state’s workers’ compensation system. If allowed to fester, it will keep workers from receiving timely medical treatment for workplace injuries. It will delay workers’ recoveries and…

The average total cost per workers’ compensation claim in Illinois grew annually between 1 to 3 percent since 2012, according to a recent study by the Workers Compensation Research Institute. The growth was due to small to moderate changes in medical payments per claim, indemnity benefits per claim, and benefit delivery expenses per claim, according to Ramona Tanabe, WCRI’s executive…

Potential standards to prevent workplace violence in the health care sector and improve emergency response and preparedness are back on the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s radar. In July 2017, the two potential standards were moved off the Trump administration’s main regulatory agenda and placed on a long-term actions list, meaning the agency did not expect to have a regulatory action…

The U.S. workforce has steadily gotten older over the past two decades, which has both positive and negative connotations for workplace safety, experts say. In 1994, people ages 55 and older represented 11.9% of the labor force – a number that is rising and is expected to reach 24.9% in 2024, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.…

The Fifth District Appellate Court backed the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Commission (IWCC) in a Madison County workplace injury case, according to a May 4 ruling. James Burns appealed a Madison County circuit court ruling that backed the IWCC, which overturned an arbitrator’s judgement that rewarded Burns with benefits. The courts’ decision comes after Burns stated that he worked under harsh…

Provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act have resulted in proposals and approvals for midyear workers compensation rate reductions in five states, according to details behind several recent filings by the National Council on Compensation Insurance. Rate reductions will go into effect June 1 for Idaho and Florida, per recent regulatory approval. Reductions have not been announced in other…