Working to
Prevent Injuries and Save Lives in Road Construction
BOTTOM-LINE BENEFIT IN
ROAD CONSTRUCTION:
Hearing Protection
Road
construction companies pay out some $14 million more for hearing-loss
injuries each year than it would cost them to equip all of their
noise-hazard-exposed workers with hearing protection. That is
the bottom line for road construction companies, according to
figures compiled from the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health
Administration (OSHA), Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), National
Safety Council (NSC), American Road and Transportation Builders
Association (ARTBA), and ISEA.
How so? Start with 574,000 hazard-exposed road construction workers in the private sector (ARTBA). Apply a 30.4% usage rate for disposable earplugs among road construction workers (OSHA), meaning that 69.6% (399,500) are not using earplugs (and most likely no other type of hearing protection, such as earmuffs). Multiply that number of workers by the cost each year to equip each worker with four pairs of earplugs a day (at 15 cents a pair) for 150 days a year ($90), yielding a total cost of $35.96 million to equip with earplugs all remaining road construction workers.
Now multiply the total number of annual hearing-loss injuries in road construction, which is about 1,780 (based on conservative extrapolation from BLS data), by the $28,000 cost per on-the-job injury (NSC), yielding a total cost for hearing-loss injuries in road construction of $49.8 million. Subtract the $35.96 million cost of equipping all unprotected workers from that figure to derive the $14 million more that road construction companies pay out each year for hearing-loss injuries.
"We believe that wearing today's high-performance, comfortable hearing protectors - earmuffs as well as reusable and disposable earplugs - will protect against a vast majority of hearing-loss injuries, adding immeasurable quality of life for those who use them regularly - and their families - over the course of a career," said ISEA President Dan Shipp.
"This data suggests that road construction companies are spending a whole lot more to cover the costs of hearing-loss injuries each year than they would pay to equip their workers properly and make sure they are wearing their earplugs or muffs." For details on the statistical basis of this cost-benefit analysis, contact ISEA's Joe Walker, 703-525-1695 or jwalker@safetyequipment.org.
INTERNATIONAL SAFETY EQUIPMENT
ASSOCIATION
703-525-1695
fax 703-528-2148
1901 North Moore Street
Arlington, Virginia 22209-1762
USA