North Carolina On-the-Job Deaths Rise to Highest Level Since 2008

Signs that more people are dying on the job has workers’ advocates demanding that North Carolina’s labor department do more to inspect and punish companies that imperil their workers.

Members of the AFL-CIO labor union, the NC Council of Churches and others on Friday remembered the 183 North Carolina workers who died on the job in 2017, the latest year for which there are figures.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported last month that work-related fatalities in North Carolina increased in 2017 to the highest number since the Great Recession hit in 2008. Fatal occupational injuries in the state have ranged from a high of 234 in 2000 to a low of 109 in 2013.

Transportation accidents were the greatest category of workplace deaths, followed by falls and slips.