What Does OSHA Stand for and What Does it Do?

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration, or OSHA, is a unit of the US Department of Labor that develops and enforces standards to protect workers. It also has the power to create workplace safety rules and inspect jobsites for compliance.

According to OSHA law, such a right to a safe workplace is a fundamental human right. All employers must comply with OSHA’s mandates and ensure a safe and healthful workplace for all employees.

How Did OSHA Form?

In 1970 for example Congress reported annual numbers like the following:

• Over 14,000 workers’ deaths due to job related accidents.
• Almost 2 and ½ million workers were disabled.
• The number of person-days lost due to job-related disabilities was ten times that lost due to strikes.
• There were an estimated 300,000 new cases of occupational diseases

The strain on the nation’s commerce in lost production and wages, medical, expenses and disability compensation was mind numbing.

Calculating human cost was not possible. It is for this reason that in 1979 a bipartisan Congress enacted the Occupational Safety and Health Act “to assure so far as possible every working man and woman in the Nation safe and healthful working conditions and to preserve our human resources”.

What Does OSHA Stand For?

As a result of the Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration was established in the Labor Department.

In short, OSHA, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, protects workers’ safety and health.

Since its formation in 1970, OSHA has cut the work-fatality rate in half, decreased the injury and illness rates in industries covered by OSHA’s focus, practically eliminated brown lung in textiles, and achieved major reductions in trenching and excavation deaths.

OSHA is run through the Department of Labor or DOL. The DOL administers and enforces hundreds of federal laws. These laws and their implementing regulations apply to the vast majority of the work force in both the public and private sectors in the United States in most work place activities.

Who Does OSHA Cover?

It is OSHA that defines what standards should apply to your workplace and requires your compliance with these standards and their requirements.

OSHA covers the public and private sector workers, and their employers, who fall under the Federal Government jurisdiction. Coverage may be provided directly by federal OSHA or through state programs. The self-employed as well as immediate relatives of farm families that do not hire outside labor are not covered by OSHA.

OSHA’s Web site osha.gov has extensive sections on training, small business, construction, state programs, and interactive eTools for employers and employees.

OSHA also provides hazard recognition training courses for employers and employees. Currently, some states require training.