We hear a lot about tort reform and the supposed high cost of compensation for the injured but what we don’t hear is that insurance rates are actually going down for accident related injuries. Alex Sink, Florida’s Chief Financial Officer just ordered a 50 percent reduction in the Workers’ Compensation Administration Trust Fund assessment rate. Since 2003 the rates have dropped about forty percent already. Workers compensation insurance pays for all injuries on the job. These include injuries involving only employees of a company and injuries involving third parties such as on the job car accidents, slip and fall accidents and accidents caused by others. One of the reasons that workers compensation rates are lower is that workers compensation insurers actually get paid back when injured workers recover for claims against third parties responsible for an accident. This is an example of the tort system working to actually reduce insurance rates while holding negligent parties, not innocent employers or employees, accountable for the damages they cause.
For more information on this subject, please refer to our section on Workplace Injuries and Discrimination.
