On Monday, November 28, an unidentified construction worker fell 162 feet to his death while working at a non-union construction site in the Upper West Side. Fellow construction workers huddled below the scaffolding the following night to mourn his death. A makeshift vigil was left at the site consisting of flowers and candles to honor his memory.
Across the city, construction worker vigils are common. His death was the third in November.
On November 1, 27-year-old immigrant worker Raúl Tenelema Puli was killed at a Brooklyn construction site. The next day, another construction worker was killed while working on a construction site in Queens.
According to most recent data collected by the state, deaths at New York City construction sites appear to be on the rise with the majority of those deaths occurring on non-union sites. Immigrant workers are also disproportionately dying on construction sites. In response, policymakers are calling for the governor to sign a long-awaited bill that aims to reduce deaths and injuries.
Nearly 80 percent of private construction in New York is done by non-union workers. The decline in non-union construction labor began over the past decade as the city began to recover from the damage of the 2008 recession. For contractors looking to save money, open-shop work sites, which are jobs that employ mostly non-union workers but hire some union workers as well, are up to 30 percent cheaper than union sites. Part of the reason it’s cheaper is that contractors are not required to pay union wages or benefits, nor are they obligated to adhere to union rules. A 2021 report by the Economic Policy Institute found that union construction workers earned on average 40 percent more than their non-union workers.
In 2018, the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH) released a report that found that 86 percent of construction deaths in New York were on non-union work sites. The report found that sites were not as thoroughly inspected as union work sites.
Monday’s tragic incident was no different. The worker who died was employed by the Brooklyn-based scaffolding company Rennon Construction Corp. The company racked up over $10,000 in Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) violations in 2018. The Department of Buildings immediately issued a stop work order for the site and is currently investigating.
“Construction workers in our City deserve a safe working environment, and incidents like this week’s fatal fall are completely unacceptable,” Ryan J. Degan, OSHA Deputy Press Secretary said. “We are conducting a thorough investigation, along with our partners in law enforcement, into exactly how this could have happened, and to determine whether any corners were cut on the job which may have been contributing factors.”
A representative for Rennon Construction Corp declined to comment for this story.
8 comments:
This is what the left defends.
This is sad. Just sad. The USA is turning into a "HELP ME PLEASE" Country at all cost. Sad very Sad...
Meanwhile the UFT is the most useless Union in America !
Don't confuse political rhetoric with facts. Construction work is dangerous, no matter what. The vast majority of construction work throughout the state is non-union. Way more than 80%. Unless you live or work in a city high rise, your building was almost certainly built non-union. "Union rules" are not just safety rules; safety rules apply to everyone. Note the article says 86% of construction deaths are on non-union sites. That means 14% are union - which about reflects the percentage of work that's done union.
Easier to trick someone than to convince them they've been tricked has never made more sense.
Just blame Putin. Simple minds will have an easier time understanding.
Unions are for communists!
Non union construction work is definitely the most dangerous work in NYC and is disproportionately so in the industry. That isn’t political rhetoric just plain facts. The work is dangerous when done without following standards, for workers who can’t identify where the hazards are or the potential hazards could be, solely relying on an employer to get you home at the end of the day is a mistake and that is the main difference between union and non union. Also open shop jobs aren’t categorized as union or non union for one and the article states percentages for NYS aim 2018 a more recent report from NYCOSH reports statewide statistically the death rate on non union sites are the same but in 2020 in NYC 100% were non union.
Post a Comment