The Washington Post’s Wonk Blog has a piece this week on the burgeoning costs of regulations. WaPo’s Jim Tankersley writes, “If you’re a business leader or conservative economist who worries that the federal government is strangling the economy in red tape, 2012 was a banner year. If you’re a consumer advocate or an environmentalist anxious for the government to do more to boost public health … ditto.”

State of the EHS Nation- Exclusive results from ISHN’s 28^th annual White Paper Reader Survey:

Of course there is much chatter about the upcoming presidential elections. According to a recent ISHN magazine poll, safety profession will overwhelmingly vote for Mitt Romney.

The malingering global economy has created, in many workplaces, a pervasive climate of fear. Fear can undermine worker safety in many ways. But unless we understand the nature and origins of this fear, we can never implement effective countermeasures.

The economy added 96,000 jobs in August – enough to lower the unemployment rate to 8.1 percent, but not enough to meet most economists’ predictions of 125,000 new jobs.

In an ISHN exclusive, Rick Pollock, CSP, founder of CLMI training company, and the incoming president of the American Society of Safety Engineers, describes the road ahead for both ASSE and the safety profession: