“As COVID-19 continues to disrupt the workplace, legal analysts struggle to predict how infected laborers’ claims will fare in workers’ compensation systems. Workers’ compensation systems vary across states, but their purpose is the same – to give employees who are injured through the everyday completion of their jobs access to surefire compensation. States require almost all private employers to carry workers’ compensation insurance, and workers’ compensation is usually an injured employee’s sole remedy. When injured on the job, the employee trades her ability to bring a potentially more lucrative tort action for the assured benefits of workers’ compensation. This trade is often referred to as the ‘Grand Bargain’. In addition to mandating workers’ compensation benefits for employees injured in workplace accidents, all states require that employers provide workers’ compensation for occupational diseases – illnesses arising from dangerous working conditions …
Moore, Dylan V, Striking a New Grand Bargain: Workers’ Compensation as a Pandemic Social Safety Net, University of Chicago Legal Forum: volume 2021, article 17.
First posted 2022-02-09 18:00:09
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