Figure B

Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) compliance officers now responsible for far more workers than 40 years ago: Employment per OSHA compliance officer, 1978–2018

Year Covered workers per compliance officer
1978            60,118
1979            61,642
1980            60,710
1981            69,916
1982            88,106
1983            76,816
1984            90,007
1985            93,782
1986          100,761
1987          101,166
1988            90,432
1989          103,119
1990            90,277
1991            93,952
1992            97,036
1993          103,699
1994          111,831
1995          117,053
1996          126,415
1997          115,368
1998          120,581
1999          125,334
2000          133,621
2001          129,506
2002          126,090
2003          123,117
2004          128,507
2005          137,627
2006          141,175
2007          142,791
2008          144,023
2009          138,437
2010          125,808
2011          122,201
2012          130,911
2013          134,777
2014          138,553
2015          147,923
2016          149,023
2017          160,558
2018         177,460
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Economic Policy Institute

Source: EPI calculations from AFL-CIO's "Death on the Job, The Toll of Neglect, 2019" data on OSHA compliance officers from 1978-2018 and Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) data on the total number of employees covered by unemployment insurance programs in the U.S from 1978–2017. At the time of writing, full year 2018 data were not available, so the 2018 number of covered workers is imputed as the 2017 QCEW value multiplied by the ratio of the 2018 annual average of all employees in the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey to the 2017 CES annual average.

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