Latest news with #OSHA
New York Post
3 days ago
- Business
- New York Post
Behind the ‘boondoggle' of Gavin Newsom's high-speed rail dream
We're a long way from the transcontinental railroad. We built the iconic American infrastructure project in the 1860s in about six years, putting down 1,776 miles of track and blasting 15 tunnels through the Sierra Nevada mountains. Granted, working conditions back then didn't exactly meet OSHA standards. Advertisement Yet, if today's rules and practices applied, the project would have been stalled for years somewhere outside Sacramento, Calif., caught up in endless environmental lawsuits. The Golden State's emblematic, modern infrastructure project was supposed to be a high-speed rail link between its two largest cities. Advertisement Don't expect, though, to see the equivalent of the Golden Spike any time soon, or perhaps ever. The high-speed rail project has been agonizingly slow: After about 15 years of grinding delay and cost overruns, not one piece of track has been laid, a record of futility hard to match. California high-speed rail is the West Coast's answer to Boston's notorious Big Dig that took about a decade longer to build than anticipated at a much greater cost, although it was eventually completed. Advertisement Now, the Trump administration is cutting off $4 billion in federal funds for the project, arguing that it doesn't want to pour any more money into a boondoggle. The imagined bullet train was always a misfire. The idea of high-speed rail has a nearly erotic appeal to progressives, who love communal trains over individualized autos and think cars are destroying the planet whereas trains can save it. High-speed rail is to transit what windmills are to energy — an environmentally correct, futuristic technology that will always under-deliver. Advertisement California voters passed Proposition 1A getting the ball — if not any actual trains — rolling in 2008. The project was supposed to cost $33 billion and connect Los Angeles and San Francisco. What could go wrong? Well, everything. Bad decisions about where to build the tracks, complacent contractors, environmental and union rules— you name it. The initial, scaled-back line is now supposed to be completed by 2033, and even that is optimistic. Elon Musk might put a man on Mars before Gov. Gavin Newsom or one of his successors manages to get even a much less ambitious high-speed rail system underway. The current focus is a line between Merced (pop. 93,000) and Bakersfield (413,000). No offense to the good people of either of these places, but these aren't major metropolises. In Northeast terms, this is less a rail connection between New York City and Washington, DC, and more a connection between Newark, NJ, and Bridgeport, Conn. Advertisement Passenger estimates for the California system have always been absurd. The fantasy is that ridership will be double what it is now is in the Northeast corridor. But as Marc Joffe of the California Policy Center points out, population is much denser near Northeast stations, it's easier to get around cities in the Northeast on the way to or from the train, and a rail culture is much more embedded in the Northeast than car-centric California. As for reducing greenhouse emissions, the long-running project is itself a significant source of emissions and the benefit of fewer drivers in cars will be vitiated by the fact more and more people in California will be driving electric vehicles. Get opinions and commentary from our columnists Subscribe to our daily Post Opinion newsletter! Thanks for signing up! Enter your email address Please provide a valid email address. By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Never miss a story. Check out more newsletters Advertisement The original estimated $33 billion cost is now $35 billion for just the scaled-back line, and more than $100 billion and counting for the whole shebang. There is no reason that the feds should pour good money after bad supporting a preposterous project that doesn't have any national significance. California governor Gavin Newsom — too embarrassed to admit failure or too drunk on visions of European-style rail — remains fully committed. Advertisement In a statement, he said Trump's defunding decision is a 'gift to China,' as if Beijing cares whether people get to Bakersfield by car, plane or high-speed rail. The project has already been a distressing object lesson in California's inability to build anything of consequence, and there's more where that came from. Twitter: @RichLowry
TechCrunch
3 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
SpaceX worker injury rates at Starbase outpace industry rivals
SpaceX employees are more likely to be injured while working at Starbase than any of its other manufacturing facilities, according to company worker safety records reviewed by TechCrunch. Starbase, a sprawling launch-and-manufacturing site that recently incorporated as its own Texas city, logged injury rates almost six times higher than the average for comparable space vehicle manufacturing outfits and nearly three times higher than aerospace manufacturing as a whole in 2024, according to Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) data released in May. That outsized injury rate has persisted since 2019, when SpaceX began sharing Starbase injury data with the federal regulator. Starbase is home to SpaceX's most ambitious program: a fully reusable, ultra-heavy-lift rocket called Starship. The company has been moving at a breakneck pace to bring Starship online to launch Starlink internet satellites and other payloads. Since Starship's first orbital test in April 2023, SpaceX has attempted eight additional integrated flights. During three of those tests, the company made history by catching the massive Super Heavy booster with 'chopstick' arms attached to the launch tower. The data suggests that SpaceX's rapid progress comes at a cost. And while injury rates alone don't provide a complete picture of the safety culture at Starbase, they do offer a rare glimpse into the working conditions of the world's leading space company. Breaking down Starbase numbers Starbase City, an unincorporated town in Texas. Image Credits:SpaceX OSHA uses a standardized safety metric called Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) to measure a company's safety record and compare it to industry peers, like Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance. The publicly available data has limitations. It doesn't distinguish between minor injuries like stitches versus serious incidents such as amputations. TechCrunch calculated the TRIR based on that data, which includes the total number of incidents and total number of hours worked by SpaceX employees at each site. Techcrunch event Tech and VC heavyweights join the Disrupt 2025 agenda Netflix, ElevenLabs, Wayve, Sequoia Capital — just a few of the heavy hitters joining the Disrupt 2025 agenda. They're here to deliver the insights that fuel startup growth and sharpen your edge. Don't miss the 20th anniversary of TechCrunch Disrupt, and a chance to learn from the top voices in tech — grab your ticket now and save up to $675 before prices rise. Tech and VC heavyweights join the Disrupt 2025 agenda Netflix, ElevenLabs, Wayve, Sequoia Capital — just a few of the heavy hitters joining the Disrupt 2025 agenda. They're here to deliver the insights that fuel startup growth and sharpen your edge. Don't miss the 20th anniversary of TechCrunch Disrupt, and a chance to learn from the top voices in tech — grab your ticket now and save up to $675 before prices rise. San Francisco | REGISTER NOW Starbase, which plays a central role in SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's mission to make life multi-planetary, is an outlier in the company and across the industry as a whole. Its TRIR topped out at 4.27 injuries per 100 workers in 2024, when it employed an average of 2,690 workers, according to the data submitted to OSHA. Injured Starbase employees were unable to perform their normal job duties for a total of 3,558 restricted-duty days, plus 656 lost-time days where injuries made them unable to work at all. Starbase is classified by the U.S. government as a space vehicle manufacturing operation. The injury rate in this sector has fallen dramatically since 1994, dropping from 4.2 injuries per 100 workers to 0.7 injuries per 100 workers in 2023, according to historical data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (BLS calculates these rates through its annual company surveys, which asks for the same information found in OSHA's worker injury forms.) But despite major changes in safety processes across the industry, Starbase is closer to the rates of 30 years ago. The injury rate across all of SpaceX's manufacturing facilities — which includes an engine development and testing site in McGregor, Texas; a Starlink satellite manufacturing complex in Bastrop, Texas; the Falcon rocket complex in Hawthorne, California; and another satellite manufacturing site in Redmond, Washington — is 2.28. These other facilities report lower TRIR rates, though most still exceed the industry averages. For instance, 2024 data shows TRIR rates 2.48 at McGregor, 3.49 at Bastrop, 1.43 at Hawthorne, 2.89 at the Redmond site. The 2024 TRIR for aerospace manufacturing as a whole is 1.6. SpaceX also operates several non-manufacturing sites, including barge operations off both coasts, offices in Sunnyvale, California, and launch sites at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg Space Force Base. Former OSHA Chief of Staff Debbie Berkowitz told TechCrunch via email that Starbase's TRIR 'is a red flag that there are serious safety issues that need to be addressed.' However, there is a debate among safety professionals about whether TRIR is the most reliable metric for assessing and predicting injury rates, particularly serious incidents like fatalities, and especially for small companies. A recent paper on TRIR questioned its statistical validity and advocated that organizations use alternative measures of safety performance instead. Of the 14 OSHA inspections at SpaceX facilities over the past four years, six involved accidents and injuries at Starbase. That includes a partial finger amputation in 2021 and a crane collapse in June 2025. The latter inspection is still ongoing. Investigations by other news outlets including Reuters have uncovered hundreds of previously unreported worker injuries, including crushed limbs and one fatality. The 2024 injury rate at Starbase marks an improvement to that of the prior year, which topped out at 5.9 injuries per 100 workers in 2023 and 4.8 injuries in 2022. But it still leads among SpaceX's land-based facilities, and is second overall only to its west coast booster recovery operations, which has a TRIR of 7.6. OSHA confirmed TechCrunch's calculation of Starbase's TRIR over email, but otherwise did not respond to questions regarding that location's injury rate. SpaceX did not respond to request for comment. NASA's stake NASA Crew-2 Mission in 2021 returns to Earth. Image Credits:SpaceX under a CC BY NC 2.0 license. NASA has a major stake in Starship's development. The agency is counting on using the rocket to return humans to the Moon before the end of this decade, and it is paying more than $4 billion to SpaceX for two crewed Starship flights to the lunar surface. Both the contract for the Starship lander and SpaceX's contract for its Commercial Crew services to the International Space Station contain particular clauses that allow the agency to take action in the case of a major breach of safety, such as a fatality or a 'willful' or 'repeat' OSHA violation. While a persistently high TRIR rate can be evidence of a safety problem, it is not an automatic trigger for action, and does not fall under the definition of a 'major breach of safety' in their contracts. 'NASA interacts frequently with its partners, including SpaceX, to ensure safety from a mission assurance perspective, and remains in regular contact with the company during normal contract administration,' a NASA spokesperson told TechCrunch in response to questions about the company's TRIR. 'Safety is paramount to NASA's mission success. The agency continues to work with all our commercial partners to build and maintain a healthy safety culture.' Among rocket makers with vehicles in operation, Starbase still leads the pack: at ULA's manufacturing facility in Decatur, Alabama, the TRIR is 1.12 injuries per 100 workers; at Blue Origin's rocket park on the coast of Florida, the rate is 1.09.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Starbase injury rates outpace rivals as SpaceX chases its Mars moonshot
SpaceX employees are more likely to be injured while working at Starbase than any of its other manufacturing facilities, according to company worker safety records reviewed by TechCrunch. Starbase, a sprawling launch-and-manufacturing site that recently incorporated as its own Texas city, logged injury rates almost six times higher than the average for comparable space vehicle manufacturing outfits and nearly three times higher than aerospace manufacturing as a whole in 2024, according to Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) data released in May. That outsized injury rate has persisted since 2019, when SpaceX began sharing Starbase injury data with the federal regulator. Starbase is home to SpaceX's most ambitious program: a fully reusable, ultra-heavy-lift rocket called Starship. The company has been moving at a breakneck pace to bring Starship online to launch Starlink internet satellites and other payloads. Since Starship's first orbital test in April 2023, SpaceX has attempted eight additional integrated flights. During three of those tests, the company made history by catching the massive Super Heavy booster with 'chopstick' arms attached to the launch tower. The data suggests that SpaceX's rapid progress comes at a cost. And while injury rates alone don't provide a complete picture of the safety culture at Starbase, they do offer a rare glimpse into the working conditions of the world's leading space company. Breaking down Starbase numbers OSHA uses a standardized safety metric called Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) to measure a company's safety record and compare it to industry peers, like Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance. The publicly available data has limitations. It doesn't distinguish between minor injuries like stitches versus serious incidents such as amputations. TechCrunch calculated the TRIR based on that data, which includes the total number of incidents and total number of hours worked by SpaceX employees at each site. Starbase, which plays a central role in SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's mission to make life multi-planetary, is an outlier in the company and across the industry as a whole. Its TRIR topped out at 4.27 injuries per 100 workers in 2024, when it employed an average of 2,690 workers, according to the data submitted to OSHA. Injured Starbase employees were unable to perform their normal job duties for a total of 3,558 restricted-duty days, plus 656 lost-time days where injuries made them unable to work at all. Starbase is classified by the U.S. government as a space vehicle manufacturing operation. The injury rate in this sector has fallen dramatically since 1994, dropping from 4.2 injuries per 100 workers to 0.7 injuries per 100 workers in 2023, according to historical data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (BLS calculates these rates through its annual company surveys, which asks for the same information found in OSHA's worker injury forms.) But despite major changes in safety processes across the industry, Starbase is closer to the rates of 30 years ago. The injury rate across all of SpaceX's manufacturing facilities — which includes an engine development and testing site in McGregor, Texas; a Starlink satellite manufacturing complex in Bastrop, Texas; the Falcon rocket complex in Hawthorne, California; and another satellite manufacturing site in Redmond, Washington — is 2.28. These other facilities report lower TRIR rates, though most still exceed the industry averages. For instance, 2024 data shows TRIR rates 2.48 at McGregor, 3.49 at Bastrop, 1.43 at Hawthorne, 2.89 at the Redmond site. The 2024 TRIR for aerospace manufacturing as a whole is 1.6. SpaceX also operates several non-manufacturing sites, including barge operations off both coasts, offices in Sunnyvale, California, and launch sites at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg Space Force Base. Former OSHA Chief of Staff Debbie Berkowitz told TechCrunch via email that Starbase's TRIR 'is a red flag that there are serious safety issues that need to be addressed.' However, there is a debate among safety professionals about whether TRIR is the most reliable metric for assessing and predicting injury rates, particularly serious incidents like fatalities, and especially for small companies. A recent paper on TRIR questioned its statistical validity and advocated that organizations use alternative measures of safety performance instead. Of the 14 OSHA inspections at SpaceX facilities over the past four years, six involved accidents and injuries at Starbase. That includes a partial finger amputation in 2021 and a crane collapse in June 2025. The latter inspection is still ongoing. Investigations by other news outlets including Reuters have uncovered hundreds of previously unreported worker injuries, including crushed limbs and one fatality. The 2024 injury rate at Starbase marks an improvement to that of the prior year, which topped out at 5.9 injuries per 100 workers in 2023 and 4.8 injuries in 2022. But it still leads among SpaceX's land-based facilities, and is second overall only to its west coast booster recovery operations, which has a TRIR of 7.6. OSHA confirmed TechCrunch's calculation of Starbase's TRIR over email, but otherwise did not respond to questions regarding that location's injury rate. SpaceX did not respond to request for comment. NASA's stake NASA has a major stake in Starship's development. The agency is counting on using the rocket to return humans to the Moon before the end of this decade, and it is paying more than $4 billion to SpaceX for two crewed Starship flights to the lunar surface. Both the contract for the Starship lander and SpaceX's contract for its Commercial Crew services to the International Space Station contain particular clauses that allow the agency to take action in the case of a major breach of safety, such as a fatality or a 'willful' or 'repeat' OSHA violation. While a persistently high TRIR rate can be evidence of a safety problem, it is not an automatic trigger for action, and does not fall under the definition of a 'major breach of safety' in their contracts. 'NASA interacts frequently with its partners, including SpaceX, to ensure safety from a mission assurance perspective, and remains in regular contact with the company during normal contract administration,' a NASA spokesperson told TechCrunch in response to questions about the company's TRIR. 'Safety is paramount to NASA's mission success. The agency continues to work with all our commercial partners to build and maintain a healthy safety culture.' Among rocket makers with vehicles in operation, Starbase still leads the pack: at ULA's manufacturing facility in Decatur, Alabama, the TRIR is 1.12 injuries per 100 workers; at Blue Origin's rocket park on the coast of Florida, the rate is 1.09. Error while retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data Error while retrieving data
TechCrunch
3 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
Starbase injury rates outpace rivals as SpaceX chases its Mars moonshot
SpaceX employees are more likely to be injured while working at Starbase than any of its other manufacturing facilities, according to company worker safety records reviewed by TechCrunch. Starbase, a sprawling launch-and-manufacturing site that recently incorporated as its own Texas city, logged injury rates almost six times higher than the average for comparable space vehicle manufacturing outfits and nearly three times higher than aerospace manufacturing as a whole in 2024, according to Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) data released in May. That outsized injury rate has persisted since 2019, when SpaceX began sharing Starbase injury data with the federal regulator. Starbase is home to SpaceX's most ambitious program: a fully reusable, ultra-heavy-lift rocket called Starship. The company has been moving at a breakneck pace to bring Starship online to launch Starlink internet satellites and other payloads. Since Starship's first orbital test in April 2023, SpaceX has attempted eight additional integrated flights. During three of those tests, the company made history by catching the massive Super Heavy booster with 'chopstick' arms attached to the launch tower. The data suggests that SpaceX's rapid progress comes at a cost. And while injury rates alone don't provide a complete picture of the safety culture at Starbase, they do offer a rare glimpse into the working conditions of the world's leading space company. Breaking down Starbase numbers Starbase City, an unincorporated town in Texas. Image Credits:SpaceX OSHA uses a standardized safety metric called Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) to measure a company's safety record and compare it to industry peers, like Blue Origin and United Launch Alliance. The publicly available data has limitations. It doesn't distinguish between minor injuries like stitches versus serious incidents such as amputations. TechCrunch calculated the TRIR based on that data, which includes the total number of incidents and total number of hours worked by SpaceX employees at each site. Techcrunch event Tech and VC heavyweights join the Disrupt 2025 agenda Netflix, ElevenLabs, Wayve, Sequoia Capital — just a few of the heavy hitters joining the Disrupt 2025 agenda. They're here to deliver the insights that fuel startup growth and sharpen your edge. Don't miss the 20th anniversary of TechCrunch Disrupt, and a chance to learn from the top voices in tech — grab your ticket now and save up to $675 before prices rise. Tech and VC heavyweights join the Disrupt 2025 agenda Netflix, ElevenLabs, Wayve, Sequoia Capital — just a few of the heavy hitters joining the Disrupt 2025 agenda. They're here to deliver the insights that fuel startup growth and sharpen your edge. Don't miss the 20th anniversary of TechCrunch Disrupt, and a chance to learn from the top voices in tech — grab your ticket now and save up to $675 before prices rise. San Francisco | REGISTER NOW Starbase, which plays a central role in SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's mission to make life multi-planetary, is an outlier in the company and across the industry as a whole. Its TRIR topped out at 4.27 injuries per 100 workers in 2024, when it employed an average of 2,690 workers, according to the data submitted to OSHA. Injured Starbase employees were unable to perform their normal job duties for a total of 3,558 restricted-duty days, plus 656 lost-time days where injuries made them unable to work at all. Starbase is classified by the U.S. government as a space vehicle manufacturing operation. The injury rate in this sector has fallen dramatically since 1994, dropping from 4.2 injuries per 100 workers to 0.7 injuries per 100 workers in 2023, according to historical data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (BLS calculates these rates through its annual company surveys, which asks for the same information found in OSHA's worker injury forms.) But despite major changes in safety processes across the industry, Starbase is closer to the rates of 30 years ago. The injury rate across all of SpaceX's manufacturing facilities — which includes an engine development and testing site in McGregor, Texas; a Starlink satellite manufacturing complex in Bastrop, Texas; the Falcon rocket complex in Hawthorne, California; and another satellite manufacturing site in Redmond, Washington — is 2.28. These other facilities report lower TRIR rates, though most still exceed the industry averages. For instance, 2024 data shows TRIR rates 2.48 at McGregor, 3.49 at Bastrop, 1.43 at Hawthorne, 2.89 at the Redmond site. The 2024 TRIR for aerospace manufacturing as a whole is 1.6. SpaceX also operates several non-manufacturing sites, including barge operations off both coasts, offices in Sunnyvale, California, and launch sites at Cape Canaveral and Vandenberg Space Force Base. Former OSHA Chief of Staff Debbie Berkowitz told TechCrunch via email that Starbase's TRIR 'is a red flag that there are serious safety issues that need to be addressed.' However, there is a debate among safety professionals about whether TRIR is the most reliable metric for assessing and predicting injury rates, particularly serious incidents like fatalities, and especially for small companies. A recent paper on TRIR questioned its statistical validity and advocated that organizations use alternative measures of safety performance instead. Of the 14 OSHA inspections at SpaceX facilities over the past four years, six involved accidents and injuries at Starbase. That includes a partial finger amputation in 2021 and a crane collapse in June 2025. The latter inspection is still ongoing. Investigations by other news outlets including Reuters have uncovered hundreds of previously unreported worker injuries, including crushed limbs and one fatality. The 2024 injury rate at Starbase marks an improvement to that of the prior year, which topped out at 5.9 injuries per 100 workers in 2023 and 4.8 injuries in 2022. But it still leads among SpaceX's land-based facilities, and is second overall only to its west coast booster recovery operations, which has a TRIR of 7.6. OSHA confirmed TechCrunch's calculation of Starbase's TRIR over email, but otherwise did not respond to questions regarding that location's injury rate. SpaceX did not respond to request for comment. NASA's stake NASA Crew-2 Mission in 2021 returns to Earth. Image Credits:SpaceX under a CC BY NC 2.0 license. NASA has a major stake in Starship's development. The agency is counting on using the rocket to return humans to the Moon before the end of this decade, and it is paying more than $4 billion to SpaceX for two crewed Starship flights to the lunar surface. Both the contract for the Starship lander and SpaceX's contract for its Commercial Crew services to the International Space Station contain particular clauses that allow the agency to take action in the case of a major breach of safety, such as a fatality or a 'willful' or 'repeat' OSHA violation. While a persistently high TRIR rate can be evidence of a safety problem, it is not an automatic trigger for action, and does not fall under the definition of a 'major breach of safety' in their contracts. 'NASA interacts frequently with its partners, including SpaceX, to ensure safety from a mission assurance perspective, and remains in regular contact with the company during normal contract administration,' a NASA spokesperson told TechCrunch in response to questions about the company's TRIR. 'Safety is paramount to NASA's mission success. The agency continues to work with all our commercial partners to build and maintain a healthy safety culture.' Among rocket makers with vehicles in operation, Starbase still leads the pack: at ULA's manufacturing facility in Decatur, Alabama, the TRIR is 1.12 injuries per 100 workers; at Blue Origin's rocket park on the coast of Florida, the rate is 1.09.
Forbes
5 days ago
- Forbes
OSHA Seeks To Disclaim Authority Over Sports And Entertainment Workers
Photo byThe Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), a division of the United States Department of Labor, is tasked with enforcing the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act), a 1970 law meant to improve the health and safety of American workers and their workplaces. The law's application to the inherently dangerous occupation of professional sports has been unclear. However, OSHA has taken legal action in the entertainment world, including an effort that ended SeaWorld shows in which trainers went into the water with orcas, over the dissent of now Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Relying on Kavanaugh's dissent, OSHA has filed a proposed rule in which it now says it has no authority over 'known hazards that are inherent and inseparable from the core nature of a professional activity or performance.' Free Willy's Trainers Among other regulatory dictates, the OSH Act requires employers to provide their 'employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or likely to cause death or serious physical harm.' This requirement is known as the General Duty Clause. To establish a violation of the General Duty Clause, OSHA must establish that: (1) an activity or condition in the employer's workplace presented a hazard to an employee; (2) either the employer or the industry recognized the condition or activity as a hazard; (3) the hazard was likely to cause, or actually caused, death or serious physical harm; and (4) a feasible means to eliminate or materially reduce the hazard existed. In 2010, after the orca Tilikum caused the death of a SeaWorld trainer, OSHA cited SeaWorld for violations of the General Duty Clause. Following an evidentiary hearing, an administrative law judge found in OSHA's favor. That decision was upheld in 2014 by a split decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The majority held that eliminating 'waterwork' (trainers swimming with the whales) was a practical method of abating the known risks to the trainers without materially affecting SeaWorld's business. The case included a notable dissent from then-Judge Kavanaugh. In Kavanaugh's view: 'In the sports and entertainment fields, the activity itself frequently carries some risk that cannot be eliminated without fundamentally altering the nature of the activity as defined within the industry. Tackling is part of football, speeding is part of stock car racing, playing with dangerous animals is part of zoo and animal shows, and punching is part of boxing, as those industries define themselves.' Consequently, Kavanaugh argued, OSHA was without the authority to 'completely forbid an industry from offering its product' and stated further that 'in sports events and entertainment shows, there is no distinction between the product being offered and its production: the product is the production.' OSHA On The Sidelines OSHA has jurisdiction over almost all private sector employees in the United States, which would also include players in the major American professional sports leagues. However, despite the obvious and extensive injury risks associated with playing professional sports, OSHA has never taken any action in that arena. In fact, in the few instances in which OSHA has received inquiries concerning its regulatory authority over NFL players, it has declined to engage. In response to letters from an insurance company and fans, OSHA has implausibly stated that NFL players are independent contractors, and not employees, and therefore not within its jurisdiction. Additionally, in a 2008 letter, OSHA stated that it had 'no specific standards that address protection for professional athletes participating in athletic competitions,' and that '[i]n most cases . . . OSHA does not take enforcement action with regard to professional athletes.' Indeed, even amid and after the concussion crises and litigation concerning the NFL in the 2010s, OSHA did not seek to get involved. In a 2018 law review article, my co-authors and I examined at length OSHA's authority over the NFL workplace and the political and practical reasons for its non-involvement. Notably, it is difficult to assess how OSHA could regulate the NFL workplace, i.e., which activities (e.g., tackles, hits) it could ban or restrict, without fundamentally changing the nature of the game. Ultimately, given that NFL players are represented by a powerful union that has collectively bargained extensive health and safety provisions into the collective bargaining agreement with the league, OSHA's involvement was always highly questionable (though the use of Guardian Caps in the NFL is generally consistent with the General Duty Clause). OSHA Quits The Game On July 1, 2025, OSHA filed a proposed rule through which it seeks to interpret the General Duty Clause as excluding from its jurisdiction 'known hazards that are inherent and inseparable from the core nature of a professional activity or performance.' More specifically, OSHA says it cannot 'prohibit, restrict, or penalize inherently risky activities that are intrinsic to professional, athletic, or entertainment occupations.' In crafting the proposed rule, OSHA quoted extensively from Justice Kavanaugh's dissent in the SeaWorld case, though it did not analyze how its proposed rule would apply in practice. OSHA also claims that its regulation of the sports and entertainment industries invokes the major questions doctrine, through which, according to OSHA, regulatory agencies are not to act on questions of 'vast economic and political significance without a clear congressional mandate.' In OSHA's view, there is no indication that the General Duty Clause was intended by Congress to 'prohibit the core design of performances or sports.' OSHA concluded that its new rule would affect individuals classified as professional athletes, actors, dancers, musicians and singers, and other entertainers and performers. In total, there are an estimated 115,620 people employed in these roles. Confusingly, OSHA estimates that the rule will only affect 1% of these employees, or about 1,100 people. This estimate is hard to square with the fact that in any given year, there are about 2,000 players in the NFL, 1,000 players in MLB, 750 players in the NHL, and 500 players in the NBA. OSHA further estimates that 514 employers would be affected by the rule but did not explicitly reference or discuss any such employers. OSHA then estimated, without any explanation, that the rule would save each employer an average of $1,000 annually, resulting in a total estimated cost savings of $514,000. While professional sports have not faced OSHA action, entertainment productions – such as the Ringling Brothers circus and the Broadway production of Spider-Man – occasionally have. Consequently, OSHA's estimated cost savings seem to have at least some basis. Commentators At The Bat The public has until August 30, 2025 to submit comments on OSHA's proposed rule before OSHA can issue a final, binding rule. OSHA has specifically asked the public to weigh in on how many employees and employers would be affected by the rule and its potential benefits and costs. The NFLPA and MLBPA declined to comment about whether they intend to submit comments to OSHA. Given that OSHA has not previously involved itself in professional sports, the more likely commentary would come from employees and their unions in the entertainment world.
