We all know what OSHA can’t do. The “can’t do’s” result from influences almost too numerous to name. Most have been barriers for years if not decades: a lack of political will out of the White House to regulate occupational safety and health; lack of public concern, much less outrage; Congressional gridlock; an army of K Street lobbyists and attorneys who argue regs will trip up our teeter-toddling economy. We need jobs, jobs, jobs, and bring the middle class back to life, not issue standards on dust — silica and/or combustible. No wonder it takes 8 to 16 years to set a significant standard.
OSHA ought to take its $500-$600 million budget, cut back on standards-setting, double down hard on “bad actors,” and lobby to raise fines to levels approaching EPA penalties for egregious neglect and fatalities like we saw in West, Texas, in April.