Second Injury Fund: Missouri Auditor Says Fund It, or Shut It Down

"The fund is currently insolvent, with unpaid liabilities totaling over $28.1 million, and no means to pay the benefits required by statute. To remedy this situation, the Governor and legislature need to work together to determine whether the fund's statutory purpose remains the state public policy or the program should be reduced or eliminated. If it is decided the program should be continued, a plan should be adopted to re-capitalize the fund and ensure future revenues are adequate to cover statutorily required benefits in the future."

Thomas A. Schweich, MO State Auditor (Jan. 11, 2013)

Click here to read to report

Read more about "Second Injury Funds" and workers' compensation

Are Second Injury Funds Going to be History Soon? - Workers ...

Mar 20, 2012

Workers' Compensation: Are Second Injury Funds Going to be History Soon? As the Second Injury Fund debate in Missouri becomes more heated, one must consider the underlying issues challenging its existence. Whatever ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Rescue Legislation for Missouri Second Injury Fund Fails - Workers ...

Apr 21, 2010

The Missouri legislature failed to pass legislation that would rescue the state's Second Injury Fund (SIF) from financial collapse. The SIF has been long targeted for extinction by Industry in Missouri. The Attorney General order ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Workers' Compensation: NJ Second Injury Fund Is In Financial Trouble

Jan 25, 2010

NJ Second Injury Fund Is In Financial Trouble. Governor Christie's transition team reported that the NJ Second Injury Fund (SIF) is insolvent. Several options were presented, if the SIF is going continue to operate. The SIF was ...

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

Workers' Compensation: Missouri, The Second Injury Fund and ...

May 09, 2011

In an editorial it declares that injured workers should receive benefits that they have been awarded un the Missouri workers' compensation Second Injury Fund which is now underfunded and unable to meet payment.

http://workers-compensation.blogspot.com/

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Downton Abbey and Workers' Compensation

Highclere Castle (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The PBS series, Downton Abbey, has many parallels to the nation's workers' compensation system and reflects how outdated the present benefit system is to meet current needs of injured workers.

The critically acclaimed fictional British TV series, that begins a 3rd broadcast season this month in the US. The first season was set in 1912, with the sinking the RMS Titanic and the outbreak of World War I. 

 The drama concerns itself with non-working aristocratic elite who had amassed multitudes of wealth and were land barrons. The post-Edwardian era Crawley family had a large entourage of servants, who worked 

"downstairs," at low pay and no benefits, providing services to the heirs of Downton Abbey, a lavish estate in England.

It mirrors the era of the enactment of the original European, and thereafter adopted US, workers'  compensation programs. The system provided an administrative remedy to provide a summary, remedial system of benefits to workers in lieu of a trial by jury in the civil justice system.

While workers' compensation is not explicitly mentioned in the TV series, the viewer can gain an understanding of the perspective of the oppressed employees who devoted their lives to the land owning family and considered it an honor and privilege to stay in their employ. Dedication to the employer resulted in lifelong career positions with little complaint of working conditions and lack of benefits.

The British aristocracy system portrayed in the Downton Abbey soon fell into economic ruin, as did the entire British workers' compensation system, yielding to a better medical delivery system and socialized benefits. 

On the other side of "the pond," in the US, the program has just persisted with more money going to the richest individuals, reflected in with major compensation packages. On the other hand, working Americans have lost jobs, benefits, and income as the nation's economy continues to decline. The US needs to adjust the benefit system to approach what the European Economic Union has achieved.

The second Obama Administration is beng recomposed with a Cabinet to achieve a better funded and structured benefit system. Hopefully a better benefit system will be formulated for injured workers and their families.

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The "New Normal," Special Compensation Funds and Viability

An Arizona Appeals Court has ruled that Special Funds [Second Injury Fund] used to pay workers' compensation benefits and fund the administrative agency, can be transferred to the state’s general treasury and used to fund the state’s general liabilities.

The Court , in allowing $4.7 Million to be transferred by the state Legislature to the general treasury, held that the special fund was funding source subject to legislative review and appropriation.  “….Because the legislature set the  percentage rate of premiums from the  State  Compensation Fund and private carriers to be placed in the Special Fund, the funds are public monies,” and is therefore a public fund.

Second Injury Funds have been phased out throughout the US. Major industrial states have eliminated them over the past several decades, a move historically supported as employers, insurance companies and the American Bar Association.

New Jersey still has such a fund, ie., The Second Injury Fund. It has been decimated economically after the economic downturn and a series of similar repeated raids by the legislature. While a constitutional amendment has been enacted to prohibit raids, the economy has not increased enough to withstand the fiscal challenges.

Other states face similar problems. Missouri’s fund has not been able to pay beneficiaries for decades as it heads for extinction. New York’s fund has been challenged since assessments are soaring beyond what Industry feels are sustainable in the week economy.

The real challenge facing the nation’s patchwork of workers’ compensation programs is how to fund them generally in light of increased medical costs, lack of premiums due to unemployment and the “new normal” now emerging across  the nation.

Read the decision: Industrial Commission of Arizona, et al. v. Janice K. Brewer, Governor, et al. , 1 CA-CV 11-0119 , (AZ App 2012), decided 11/23/2012.

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