How New Jersey Fails Injured Workers Nursing Research

Student’s Name:
Instructor’s Name:
Course:
Date:
How New Jersey fails injured workers
My reaction to the fact that a lot of workers’ compensation (WC) cases in New Jersey (NJ) are rescheduled 12 or more time before settling is that this is really unfair to the injured workers. The system is very flawed and it fails workers in New Jersey. These types of delays have significant impacts on the injured workers. The system benefits insurance companies and employers since delays mainly harm the cash-strapped claimants. The longer a compensation case is dragged out, the longer it will take for the ill or injured worker to get paid and the more legal costs the individual incurs. In addition, the workers can no longer work and provide for their families. In essence, these injured workers and their families do not just encounter lost wages, but also high medical bills. Sometimes the injured workers die while waiting for their compensation which takes a significant toll to the entire family. Many families experience a devastating emotional and fiscal hit that takes a long time to recover from, and some even end up losing their houses which are sold.
Regarding employers who ignore mandates of WC court judges, NJ is different from other states in that WC court judges in New Jersey are inexperienced and do not have any substantial power of enforcing their orders. The compensation judges do not have the authority of jailing or fining employers who ignore their mandates. In most cases, they can do little more than make the employers pay interest on payments that are outstanding. NJ employers do not have any incentive for offering timely treatment to their injured employees given that they would not be in a worse situation after they deny their workers this treatment than they would if they offered the treatment.
There are significant conflicts in the workers’ compensation system and New Jersey’s legislature. In NJ’s state legislature, a number of the same legislators who endorse and approve WC judges in the state’s compensation courts and decide which workers’ benefits bills get considered, in fact, have law firms which earn substantial amounts of cash in compensation cases. New Jersey’s state legislature is dominated by lawyers and out of the 120 legislators, at least 10 of them are partners in law firms which handle compensation cases or also practice in workers’ compensation court. These comprise some of New Jersey’s most well known politicians like Senator Raymond Lesniak and Bernard Kenny who is a retired Senate Majority Leader. It is of note that Lesniak owns a law firm that earned substantial amount of money when it represented public agencies and school boards in workers’ compensation cases. Lesniak and Kenny both served on the Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee where a total of 5 bills died awaiting consideration. These bills were intended to boost compensation benefits to workers. In addition, legislators in New Jersey can influence the choosing of compensation judges. In 2007, Senator Gerald Cardinale requested Governor Jon Corzine to promote a certain municipal judge in Bergen County to the compensation court.
The state does not track the...