Prior to and during the early 1970s, workplace safety concerns became an issue in the United States. No consistent guidelines required employers to provide safe and healthful working environments. Workers were experiencing job-related injuries, and too often those injuries were fatal. To address these concerns, Congress enacted PL 91-596 (Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970), which established the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), a federal agency headed by an Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health. OSHA is functionally structured, with its major programs grouped into eight directorates (Administrative Programs, Construction, Compliance Programs, Federal-State Operations, Health Standards Programs, Policy, Safety Standards Programs, and Technical Support) as well as an Office of Statistics. Senior executive service members head these directorates and offices. Regional offices and subordinate area and district offices or service centers carry out various programs.

OSHA's mission, as set forth in the 1970 legislation, is to "assure…every working man and woman in the nation safe and healthful working conditions." Therefore, OSHA developed and implemented certain standards and enforcement procedures, as well as employers' compliance assistance plans to help employers achieve and maintain healthful and safe workplaces.

Organizations with ten or more employees are subject to OSHA regulation, and those not in compliance may suffer large fines. For instance, OSHA proposed fines of $46,300 against a steel firm where alleged safety violations cost two workers their lives (Kane, 1998). Since OSHA was created, workplace fatalities have decreased by half; but every day, according to Kane (1998), about seventeen Americans die on the job.

OSHA strives to create worker awareness of and commitment to resolving workplace safety and health issues by collecting and studying data to identify workplace safety and health problems, as well as achieving problem resolution through regulation, compliance assistance, and enforcement strategies. To enforce regulations, OSHA conducts unannounced, on-site inspections. Data on the OSHA Facts homepage indicate that 34,264 federal and 56,623 state inspections were conducted by OSHA during Fiscal Year 1997, and 87,710 federal and 147,610 state violations were documented. For both federal and state violations, approximately $147 billion in penalties were assessed.

While businesses agree that workplaces should be safe and healthy, many have experienced difficulty in meeting OSHA standards. Because small business owners have found OSHA standards to be financially constricting and consider OSHA penalties harsh, a reform movement is in progress. The House of Representatives has been considering incremental reform of the OSHA Act. On 17 March 1998, two bills (H.R. 2877 and H.R. 2864) concerning OSHA's consultation program and elimination of inspection and penalty quotas were approved; and on 27 March, the Workforce Protections subcommittee heard bills recommending peer review panels to oversee OSHA's rulemaking process, as well as protection from enforcement proceedings for employers meeting certain criteria. Additionally, the Safety Advancement for Employees (SAFE) Act approved in October 1997 exempts small business owners from OSHA fines for two years and allows third-party inspectors. Even with ongoing OSHA reform initiatives, no comprehensive reform bill requiring substantial change in OSHA's structure, procedures, or standards has been enacted.

More information is available from OSHA at U.S. Department of Labor, OSHA, Office of Public Affairs, Room N3647, 200 Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20210; (202) 693-1999; or http://www.osha-slc.gov/html/oshdir.html.