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NIOSH Programs > Traumatic Injury > Economic Factors
Traumatic InjuryInputs: Economic FactorsFatal Occupational InjuriesIn the United States, for the year 2005, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 5,702 fatal work injuries. Recently published NIOSH fact sheets present the total, mean, and median costs of occupational fatalities by industry (according to the Standard Industrial Classification System) and selected characteristics for the period 1992–2002. Costs are expressed as the sum of direct and indirect costs: direct costs include medical expenses, while indirect costs are expressed as the value of future earnings (in present value terms) summed from the year of death until the decedent would have reached age 67. The total cost of fatal injuries exceeded $53 billion (in 2003 dollars) during the period examined. Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. TABLE A-1. Fatal occupational injuries by industry and event or exposure, All United States, 2005 NIOSH fatal occupational injury cost fact sheets (September 2006):
Nonfatal Occupational Injuries and IllnessesIn 2005, the Bureau of Labor Statistics also reported 4.2 million nonfatal work injuries and illnesses in U.S. private industry alone. According to the Liberty Mutual 2005 Workplace Safety Index, employers spent $50.8 billion in 2003 on wage payments and medical care for workers hurt on the job. Indirect costs ranged between $152.4 and $254 billion in 2003. The annual Index study tracks the causes and costs of serious workplace injuries that cause workers to miss 6 or more days from work. The estimates are derived by combining information from Liberty Mutual, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and the National Academy of Social Insurance. The direct costs reported are costs to employers and include payments to injured workers and their medical care providers. An earlier Liberty Mutual survey found that executives believed that each $1 of direct costs generated between $3 and $5 of indirect costs, including the overtime, training, and lost productivity related to an injured employee not being able to perform their normal work. Bureau of Labor Statistics. TABLE 2. Numbers of nonfatal occupational injuries and illnesses by industry and case types, 2005. Liberty Mutual. Despite 6.2% fall in the number of serious workplace injuries, their financial impact on employers remains huge. Liberty Mutual. Direct costs of disabling work injuries grow 2.5 percent. April 7, 2003 Estimates of Worldwide BurdenDisability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) are extensively used by the World Health Organization for international comparisons of disease burden. Developed by Murray and Lopez1, DALYs conceptualize the combined effect of years lived with a disability and premature death due to an exposure to a risk factor. Each year of life lived with a disability is taken as equivalent to the loss of a certain fraction of a year of healthy life, based on the severity of the disability. Other measures that aim to combine morbidity and mortality, such as Quality Adjusted Life Years, also are increasingly being used. Worldwide, for the year 2000:
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Page last updated:
December 18, 2008
Page last reviewed: December 18, 2008 Content Source: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) Division of Safety Research |
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NIOSH Program Portfolio:Traumatic Injury |
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