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Gender Gap in Salaries and Fatalities
It has long been known and reported that construction sites are dangerous places. The presence of heavy machinery, building materials, and lack of essential protections of completed projects put those working and visiting a construction site at potentially high risk. Almost all job sites require anyone present on the construction grounds to wear proper safety attire including a hard hat. Indeed, one of the professions with the highest fatality rate among workers is those who work in the construction field. A new report on the disparity in salaries between men and women presents a unique side to the occupational fatality rate differences as well.
While the bulk of the report deals ostensibly with male-female wage differences, the report cites an interesting fact. The differences between workplace fatalities among men and women is staggering; approximately 7% of fatalities in 2008 were women, leaving men accounting for a whopping 93% of all workplace fatalities. Men were over 13 times more likely to die while on the job compared with women according to the report issued by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. While the incongruity between salaries is both alarming and offensive, a concern should be raised over the occupation risks which men find themselves in over their female counterparts. To read into the data provided by the report, it would seem that men more often than not find themselves in more dangerous job positions, such as that of a construction worker. Finding oneself in a job with inherent risks of fatality could account for some, though not all, of the differences in pay.
Indeed, the report goes on to draw this same conclusion. Occupational deaths are statistically more prevalent in male dominated industries, namely construction and manufacturing, which are comprised of an almost entirely male workforce: approximately 90% of all construction workers are male and approximately 70% of all manufacturing workers are male. Such industries have a history of being significantly more dangerous occupations than those dominated by a female workforce, such as education and health care.
Such staggering statistics, while alarming, are not unusual. One can see just by reading the news that serious construction accidents are an almost daily occurrence. With the demand for construction projects rising, especially in developing nations, more workers put themselves at risk on a daily basis in order to provide for their needs and the needs of their families. However, a debilitating construction accident could put a worker physically out of commission for months, even permanently if the accident is severe. If the accident is fatal, families depending on the construction position as the sole source of income could face a dire financial situation. Individuals who have been the victim of a serious construction accident could be entitled to legal recourse and monetary compensation if the accident was due to negligence or unsafe working conditions. Workers should consider developing a construction accident lawsuit if they have suffered financial setback or injury preventing them from work.
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