If you ask a lot of high school and college students what they are doing this summer, their answer would probably be work. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, around 50-60 percent of people ages 16-24 are employed during the month of July, which is the height of summer job season.
Why not? School isn’t in session and it is the prime time to be making extra cash before the start of classes. Sometimes this job turns seasonal and the worker can earn income during the holidays and breaks. Employers acknowledge that they are temporary.
If you are an employer and you knew your student worker would only be there for a few months, how much time would you spend training them? Would you spend the same amount of time on them as onyour other employees?
If you care about their safety and the job getting done well, you will answer yes.
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, about 250,000 youth employees incur injuries from work. These could happen because the employee was careless or possibly a freak accident occurred. However, this could have also happened because the teenager on break from college didn’t receive proper safety and job training prior to climbing up the ladder to begin painting.
Unfortunately, hazardous jobs can be the most appealing summer jobs because they don’t require sitting or standing inside all day. For example, many teens work in construction, doing home repairs, or landscaping during the summer. These require the use of complicated and dangerous tools and require risky situations to get the jobs done.
Recently, OSHA met and discussed these temporary workers and the issues surrounding them and keeping up with the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. Soon, hopefully, we will see improvements in youth worker safety and increased regulations so these injuries begin to decrease.
If you or your family member has sustained an injury in the workplace, be sure to contact an experienced personal injury attorney today.
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