The most important job in construction is for every worker to be safe

When I was a kid, we didn’t wear bike helmets. We didn’t skateboard with knee and elbow pads. We didn’t climb on plastic jungle gyms with rubber pads beneath them. But you know what? A lot of kids from my generation didn’t survive childhood because we didn’t do those things.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that the rate of construction fatalities hovers between 9.5 and 10 per 100,000 workers annually.

The same is true with construction safety. When I was a carpenter, we didn’t tie off. We didn’t wear hardhats on residential projects. We didn’t wear eye protection. What we did do was remove guards from table saws, and I spent a lot of days stripping paint with a heat gun. Paint that probably had lead in it. (No comments, please, on how that was appropriate training to be a journalist.)

People and pundits are calling the current younger generation the “Fragile Generation,” which is guarded by overprotective parents who sport monikers such as “helicopter parent” or “bulldozer parent.” Stories of parents sitting in on job interviews abound.

Yes, we may have gone too far in our overprotectiveness. And our hyper focus on dangers that are rare compared to real dangers has caused us to make curious choices. For example, on average about 350 people under 21 are abducted annually by strangers, and a very, very small percentage of them are murdered. In 2011, it was 17. But that scenario looms large as a fear among parents, who routinely strap their children into automobiles, where we lose on average 11 of them a week to car accidents.

But I don’t think we’ve gotten anywhere nearly overprotective enough on job sites. We’re still learning how to improve our best practices, safety equipment, and training. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data show that the rate of construction fatalities hovers between 9.5 and 10 per 100,000 workers annually. With a couple of exceptions, it has done so for the last decade.

I have no doubt that our best managed general contracting and trade contracting companies run excellent safety programs that focus on making sure their employees understand and follow best safety practices. But our industry also features a lot of companies that pop up today and disappear tomorrow. They’re money spinners at worst and incompetent at best.

If we’re going to improve the safety performance of the construction industry, we need to find a way to reach those companies and get them to start caring. Caring about their workers. Caring about their worker’s families. Caring about themselves.

I wish we could remove incentives, such as lowest-price contracts, to discourage the fly-by-night operators. I wish we could through market forces even the playing field so that quality would rise to the top. I wish I could convince those owners that the best way to learn how to run your company is by joining a trade association and getting exposed to the best practices of the best companies.

Unfortunately, the most efficient way to manage safety across the industry and establish minimum standards is through government regulation. Every company pays the price for the bad actions of the worst of us. They spend a lot of time dealing with regulations that may or may not be beneficial to improved safety. They live in fear of the OSHA inspection and/or fine for a minor incident that could irreparably harm their company.

Unlike some government regulations that teeter on the edge of diminishing marginal returns, though, safety regulations have a very specific and important benefit: workers go home to their families at the end of the day.

Dealing with government safety regulations isn’t nearly the highest price you could be paying.