From: glevy@PRATT.EDU
Date: Thu May 11 2006 - 19:58:41 EDT
Mike, I 'lost' a version of the last post and had to re-write it. In so doing, I forgot a point. > which is why accident rates seem interesting as a proxy. Accidents increase when there is both an increase in labor intensity and an extension of the working day, true. In both cases, there is an increase in fatigue. But, as I mentioned previously, accidents _sharply_ increase during 'overtime' (as measured in a number of studies that you can read about in occupational safety and health literature). My hypothesis is that while there is generalized fatigue in both cases, when the working day is extended there is also *sleep deprivation* and hence an even higher number of accidents. Sleep deprivation, even more than fatigue in general, is known to lead to impaired judgment and "mistakes". Mgt. often attributes these accidents to "operator error" (i.e. it's the fault of the injured workers) but the hours of work are generally a managerial decision. In solidarity, Jerry
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