Is OSHA a Failed Agency — Or an Unheralded Success?

THE DEBATE ❧ Fatal occupational injuries have fallen by 60 percent since the Occupational Safety and Health Administration was created, but how much credit it deserves is the subject of this Debate. OSHA has been out front offering advice on workplace improvements and can claim credit for successes such as brown lung disease or HIV infection among healthcare workers. However, the agency has set exposure limits for only 18 hazardous substances in its 46 years of existence. What are the agency’s most praiseworthy success stories? And if OSHA‘s achievements have been limited, who bears responsibility? What statutory, budgetary, organizational, structural, or philosophical changes could improve the agency’s record?