Workers' Compensation and Social Security: Personal and Social Costs

Abstract

This report examines aspects of the transfer of costs between State workers' compensation schemes and the Federal social welfare system. It concludes that shortfalls caused by inadequate Workers' compensation coverage have been met in the past, and continue to be met, by the social security system and private individuals.

It considers the extent to which the costs of injuries at work are falling on the social security system and the taxpayer at large. Behind this question lie others. Stewart discusses the practical and conceptual difficulty of identifying work-caused injury and illness. His Report also reviews the limitations of existing data for estimating the incidence of work-caused ill health and its personal and social costs. It is concerned, too, with the limitation on personal lifestyles associated with uncompensated or undercompensated illness and injury.