Mr. Chairman, Members of the Worforce Protection Committee,thank you for the opportunity to speak about the financial challenges the Post Office is facing by being required to provide more generous compensation for workers injured in the postal service than the inadequate compensation provided to the general public when injured at work.Ah, for the record ,Please strike the word inadequate and replace it with adequate..
I say the post office isn’t being adequately protected from the deluge of workers who claim they are being injured at work. Surely they knew or should have known that working for the post office might well lead to ergonomic injuries. There is no excuse for them to claim that it was never their intention to become injured at work when the postal office has 48% of federal injured workers.
It is common knowledge that there are more federal employees injured on the job now than in 1916 when the Federal Employees Compensation Act became law. I’m not saying we should do away with the law, only that if the benefits part of the law is decreased the injured workers will have more incentive to return to work and it is possible that the number or workers injured at work will return to the same level as as the number they were in 1916.
And how would OSHA like it if we went around insisting that our posters be put in their agency ? I’m certain that putting this information in the face of workers is the cause of an increase in the number of workers compensation cases being filed
In their chase to have a roof over their heads and indoor plumbing and other luxuries they threw caution to the winds and some, with total disregard for a prudent assessment of the fact that an injury could happen, even aspired to putting their children through college. And is it really important to have food on the table every single night?
I maintain as any reasonable person would that when employees become casualties of work, like good soldiers, they should keep on moving or fall down without a whimper.
To illustrate, the other night on TV I witnessed a Calvary officer with an arrow in his back ride his horse quite nicely and carry on a reasonable conversation. He didn’t panic and apply for worker’s compensation. On another night I viewed men with great gaping wounds spurting blood in unending streams anxious to fight on. They didn’t ask for a CA-1 or a CA-2 form to apply for compensation for their injuries.
Yet, those who claim to be injured on the job often show no external damage and even have to go to a doctor to prove their job is the culprit.
I feel with great conviction that by compensating them with such generous amounts of compensation we are destroying their will to ignore their limitations and pain by whatever means to return to work.
I maintain that the right of the post office to make financial blunders shouldn’t be challenged. This business about sponsoring the Olympics and a Bicycle Rider and over spending on advertisements, buildings, bonuses for management, deep discounts for presorted mail and whatever-else those who claim to be damaged want to dredge up, has nothing to do with cutting compensation costs.
One of our goals, of course is to pay less compensation to those injured and disabled on the job and to decrease the numbers of those receiving compensation.
This would free up the necessary funds for more safety talks and videos plus the staff needed to make sure that those who are able to work are made to do so. Project 1000 is an example of what the Post Office is doing in addition to having our own OWCP section.
.Regardless of what government reports are issued our postal employees must quit whining about their injuries. It makes us look bad.
I didn’t mean in the previous statement about whining employees that they not report their injuries. Indeed the Post Office insists that all injuries be reported even if it results in progressive discipline and drug tests which injured workers mistake for harassment
This brings us to the subject of what the employer suffers when workers fail to protect themselves properly from damage. The post office not only loses from decreased productivity or no productivity at all but has to deal with the morale of other workers who see a worker with no discernible injuries doing less work or disappearing from the work place altogether.
On the other hand when injured employees parade about wearing wrist splints, rubbing their shoulders, massaging their backs, shaking their hands, walking funny and looking grim it disturbs the other workers, Mr. Chairman.
What is even more disturbing is that when management gives them cushy jobs such as paste and repair are the injured workers grateful? Hardly. They complain about how boring their jobs are and that other workers are encouraged by Managements’ actions to harass them.
May I further complain; strike that from the record. May I further explain that money given to employees, albeit injured and disabled , is money that could be better spent on persons such as myself who work tirelessly to cut labor and compensation costs . People such as myself depend on bonuses, and promotions to better meet rising expenses.
Which brings me to the point that everyone knows that those used to less are used to living with less so that it’s not that hard to have more of less so compensation levels should be brought in line with what other injured workers get in the private sector.
At this time I would like to reserve the right to counter any remarks by the opposing side.
One week later : Injured at work he started to think
I’m not to blame I had nothing to gain It’s a rotten shame I’m not on the gravy train Nothing’s the same The rules of the game Are really a pain I’m not on the gravy train I want to be as before Couldn’t ask for more If healing takes little time The job I have will still be mine. With sick leave my income won’t be less But still I’m under such stress Now that this has happened to me My statement to a committee will be Being injured is a real drain Injured workers are not on a gravy train.
And he filed for worker’s compensation.