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Workers' compensation legislation enacted in 1998
Glenn Whittington
Workers’ compensation legislation was very light during 1998, with no sweeping changes occurring in any State.
Fraud provisions were enacted or expanded in Georgia, Kansas, Missouri, and Rhode Island. Maximum burial allowances were doubled in Maryland and Virginia. Missouri and South Dakota established scholarship funds for dependents of employees who die as a result of a compensable work-related injury. Iowa renamed its Department of Industrial Services to the Division of Workers’ Compensation; in addition, it tripled payments to the Second Injury Fund for a compensable injury resulting in death to $12,000 for cases in which the deceased has dependents, and to $45,000 for cases in which there are no dependents. In Kansas, a lump-sum payment will be paid to the deceased employee’s legal heirs in a no-dependency death claim, unless a life insurance policy in the amount of at least $18,500 has been provided by the employer.
For the purposes of workers’ compensation, Arizona now considers peace officers and firefighters, injured or killed while traveling to and from work to have been within the course and scope of their employment. Similarly, Ohio extended, the definition of "employee" to include off-duty peace officers, firefighters, and emergency medical personnel who respond to an inherently dangerous situation that calls for an immediate response — regardless of whether or not they were within the limits of their jurisdiction of regular employment or voluntary service when responding.
This excerpt is from an article published in the January 1999 issue of the Monthly Labor Review. The full text of the article is available in Adobe Acrobat's Portable Document Format (PDF). See How to view a PDF file for more information.
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