Labor Department looking to lighten workplace regulation with sweeping rules changes and repeals
The US Ministry of Labor aims to rewrite or repeal more than 60 “obsolete” regulations in the workplace, ranging from minimum wage requirements for home health workers and people with disabilities to standards governing exposure to harmful substances.
If it is approved, the large-scale changes unveiled this month would also affect working conditions on construction sites and in mines, and would limit the government’s ability to penalize employers if workers are injured or killed while engaging in intrinsically risky activities such as cinema cascades or animal training.
The Labor Department indicates that the objective is to reduce the expensive and heavy rules imposed by previous administrations and to deliver the commitment of President Trump to restore American prosperity by deregulation.
“The Ministry of Labor is proud to show the way by eliminating unnecessary regulations that suffocate growth and limit opportunities,” said work secretary Lori Chavez-Deremer in a press release, which boasted of the “most ambitious proposal to reduce the administrative formalities of any ministry through the federal government”.
Critics claim that the proposals would express workers at greater risk of damage, women and members of minority groups with a disproportionate impact.
“People are already at a very risk of dying at work,” said Rebecca Reindel, director of security and health of the AFL-CIO union. “This is something that will only overcome the problem.”
The proposed changes have several stages to go before they can take effect, including a period of comments from the public for each.
Some recruits under study
Home health workers help the elderly or medically fragile in preparing meals, administering medicines, helping the use of toilets, accompanying customers for doctor and performing other tasks. Within the framework of one of the proposals of the Labor Department, around 3.7 million workers employed by home care agencies could be paid below the federal minimum wage – currently $ 7.25 per hour – and rendered inadmissible to overtime if they are not covered by the corresponding state laws.
The proposed rule would reverse the changes made in 2013 under former President Barack Obama and would return to a regulatory framework of 1975. The Labor Department indicates that by reducing labor and compliance costs, its revisions could extend the home care market and help keep fragile individuals in their homes longer.
Judy Conti, director of government affairs of the National Employment Law Project, said that her organization planned to work hard to defeat the proposal. Home health workers are subject to customer lifting injuries, and “before these regulations (2013), it was very common for home care workers to work 50, 60 and perhaps even more hours per week without obtaining additional remuneration,” said Conti.
Others approve the proposal, including the independent Women’s Forum, a conservative non -profit organization based in virginia. Women often support the weight of family care responsibilities, so making home care more affordable would help women balance work and personal responsibilities, said group president, Carrie Lukas.
“We are delighted to see the Trump administration to go forward by backing up part of what we considered a counterproductive microgestion of relationships that made people get the care they need,” said Lukas.
Samantha Sanders, director of government affairs and plea at the Institute of non -profit economic policy, said that the repeal would not constitute a victory for women.
“To say that we do not actually think that they need these protections would be quite devastating for a workforce that does a really essential job and is very strongly dominated by women and women of color in particular,” said Sanders.
Migrant agricultural workers
Last year, the Labor Department finalized the rules which provided protections to migrant agricultural workers who held H-2A visas. The current administration indicates that most of these rules imposed unnecessary and costly requirements on employers.
Under the new proposal, the Labor Department would cancel a requirement for most transport provided by employers to have safety belts for agricultural workers.
The ministry also proposes to reverse a rule of 2024 which protected migrant agricultural workers against reprisals for activities such as filing a complaint and testimony or participating in an investigation, hearing or procedure.
“There is a long history of reprisals against workers who express themselves against abuse in agricultural work. And with H-2A, it is even worse because the employer can simply not renew your visa,” said Lori Johnson, main lawyer at Farmworker Justice.
Michael Marsh, president and chief executive officer of the National Council of Agricultural Employers, applauded deregulation efforts, saying that farmers had been struck by thousands of pages of regulations concerning migrant agricultural workers in recent years.
“Can you imagine a farmer and his spouse trying to navigate 3,000 new pages of regulation in 18 months, then be responsible for each of them?” He asked.
Construction workers
The administration of occupational safety and health, which is part of the labor service, wishes to cancel a requirement for employers to provide adequate light on construction sites, affirming that the regulations do not considerably reduce a significant risk.
The OSHA said that if employers do not correct lighting deficiencies to construction sites, the agency can issue quotes under its “general service clause”. The clause obliges employers to provide a place of employment without recognized dangers likely to cause death or serious physical damage.
Workers’ defenders believe that getting rid of a specific construction site requirement is a bad idea. “There have been many deaths where workers fall into a hole in the ground, where there is no adequate lighting,” said Reindel. “It is a very obvious thing that employers should address, but unfortunately, it is one of those things where we need a standard, and it is raped all the time.”
Minors and more
Several proposals may have an impact on mine safety procedures. For example, employers must submit plans for the ventilation and prevention of collapse of the roof in coal mines for examination by mine safety and the health of the labor service. Currently, MSHA district directors may require that mine operators take additional measures to improve these plans.
The Labor Department wishes to put an end to this authority, claiming that current regulations give the district director the possibility of writing and creating laws without requesting comments or measures of the congress.
Likewise, the ministry proposes to strip district managers of their ability to require changes in health and safety training programs.
The general service clause allows the OSHA to punish employers for dangerous working conditions when there is no specific standard in place to cover a situation.
A proposal from the OSHA would exclude the agency from the application of the clause to prohibit, restrict or penalize employers for “professional activities at intrinsic risks which are intrinsic to professional, athletic or entertainment professions”.
A preliminary analysis has identified athletes, actors, dancers, musicians, other artists and journalists as among the types of workers to which the limitation would apply.
“It is simply not plausible to assert that Congress, when it adopted the law on occupational safety and health, had silently intended to authorize the Ministry of Labor to eliminate familiar sports and entertainment practices, such as the returns of covers of clearance in the NFL, accelerating in Nascar, or The Whale Show at Seaworld”, indicates the proposed rule.
Debbie Berkowitz, who was the OSHA chief of staff during the Obama administration, said that she thought that limiting the agency’s application authority would be a mistake.
“Once you have started to remove this threat, you could come back to the place where they are going to throw safety in the wind because there are other production pressures,” said Berkowitz.
