Omar

In Reply to: Re: Why victimize the Victims posted by Omar on January 08, 2004 at 05:52:24:

Thank you, and you are making a great deal of "sense" (from someone also in California).

I hate the idea that "revisions" in WC here seem to be on the tangent of hurting employees injured on the job. As you may remember, when the WC revisionism effort was announced earlier by our new Gov., it seemed he stated he would do "right" by employees. Now, it seems that that stance has taken a dramatic turn (and not to help those whom have medically demonstrable injury that is work-related).

I live in a rather rural area of the state. I recall recently when an I-Hop franchise seemed to have "skipped" on its payment to WC for its employees. The franchise licensee "swore" he'd sent in his $127,000 payment to the state but he used a "middle-man." His employees stood by him and worked through the hours the state attempted to shut him down and order him out of business. As it turned out, after media raked him over proverbial coals, he displayed his check drafted to the state, and it turned: He was defrauded by the agency that claimed to assist employers in taking care of obligations to employees and WC.

Maybe our illustrious state needs an audit of such things for the benefit of employees and employers (those whom legitimately care about people working with/for them).

You are right: Something is "off" in this state. Business is walking from it, i.e., Earthlink just shut down another of its facilities in Roseville. The cost of doing business here is too high and without employers, no employees. Hence, WC will be moot.

No person, in my view, should have to wait such a time-length as you had (24 months) for treatment, etc. That's beyond insult.

If I may ask: Have you contacted your district rep. to speak before legislators and relate your experience? I hope that you will consider doing so -- if you've not been afforded the opportunity before now.

Friday may be a make or break day ... in terms of the Governor's plans and how he thinks to whittle away the state's billions of dollars in debt. He also wants Californians to "back" going into the red more with fed. loans (boo to that idea).

He claims that he will take his ideas for WC to voters in the Spring (2004). So you are right to bring up what you are stating prior.

I'm not the most savvy when it comes to WC, but as long as you keep sharing posts and info as you have done, I will do what I may to assure employees injured aren't "stripped" of medical and treatment remedies :)

: Apology for the confusion created by my post.

: What I intended is to start an awareness campaign to counter the governor in California and the whole Worker Comp system portraying injured workers as criminals.

: They try to portray the problems facing the state as problems created by injured workers running up huge medical and benefit bill.

: I am not asking any one to do any thing specific, but if you want to do any thing (in California) you can write ideas in your local paper, you can write to state representative and so on.

: What I wanted to explain is that the problem is not the injured worker's who have to go through very precise tests to prove they injured --in my case I had to wait 24 months without any treatment so my insurer would acknowledge I have CTS caused by using laptop computerat work -- but the problem is in the Worker's Comp concept.

: Remembet that why the workers comp was created in the first place, it was created to protect employers, I appreciate that some Workers Comp officials stand with honest injured workers but the issue here is the concept and what matters is Wokers Comp was created to protest Employers from lawsuites by injured workers.

: By creating workers Comp employers realized they are no longer liable to what ever happens at work to employees, they just dump them to workers comp. All the employers have to do is pay a premium. This is a very cheap way to get rid of liability. When the employers know they are immune from lawsuites they become lax on safety. This is why we have more and more injuries. Employees hardly get any safety training and no enforcement to any safety rules.

: The Worker Comp system is crumbling because the system as is encourages injuries, these injuries to injured workers are real but to employers they are numbers and premiums that buy immunity from liability.

: What we need is a system that promotes safety so the number of injuries go down. We need a system that looks at the employee that is an entity with rights and not just a file at HR.

:
: : Looks like they found a magic solution to solve the budget shortfal in California.

: : Now they found that victimizing injured workers is the magic wand.

: : Please restore our right to sue our employers and those who were negligent in causing our injuries and take all you stupid workers comp and shove it up yopu A$$ Mr. Nager

: : _____________
: : Schwarzenegger also has proposed sweeping legislation aimed at bringing the state's worker compensation costs down to at least the national average. The proposal would limit how much doctors, pharmacies and clinics are paid and impose new restrictions on how job-injuries are evaluated and how medical disputes are resolved.

: :
: : The average cost to employers for worker compensation insurance has nearly tripled since 1999 to nearly $30 billion a year. Schwarzenegger's plan is designed to cut more than $11 billion.