OSHA AND THE POLITICS OF REFORM - AN ANALYSIS OF OSHA REFORM INITIATIVES BEFORE THE 104TH CONGRESS

The Occupational Safety and Health Act has raised interesting and impo rtant issues about government regulation of business enterprises since its passage in 1970. The balance between worker safety and employer a utonomy has proved a difficult one to strike and has led to numerous r eform efforts. In this Article, the authors provide a brief survey of current OSHA reform legislation in tile House and Senate, and then pre sent supporting and dissenting views of specific initiatives along wit h analyses of the political interests underlying their inclusion in th e bills. The authors conclude that the current OSHA reform proposals a ll too focused on maintaining business profitability at the expense of worker protection, and they offer support for efforts at finding crea tive alternatives to dismantling OSHA in this era of federal budget re ductions.