WORKERS' COMPENSATION; STATE OFFICERS AND EMPLOYEES;

WORKERS' COMPENSATION; PUBLIC EMPLOYEES - STATE;

You asked how many days of work the state loses a year due to state employees being out on workers’ compensation due to work-related injuries.

The Department of Administrative Services (DAS) estimates that for Fiscal Year 2002-03, the state lost 178,889 days of work due to state employees being out on workers’ compensation. The total state workforce has more than 13. 6 million days of work per year. The workers’ compensation claims are from a workforce of roughly 52,000.

Joseph Prevuznak, director of the DAS workers’ compensation unit, provided this figure based on his staff doing a manual tabulation of workers’ compensation claims for the first three quarters of FY 03 and then projecting a figure for the final quarter of the year based on the first three quarters (the tabulation was done in May before the fiscal year had ended). Prevuznak said the projection could mean a margin of error of plus or minus 2%.

Table 1 shows the breakdown of days of work lost due to employees being out on workers' compensation.

Table 1: Days of Work Lost Due to Employees

Out on Workers’ Compensation (FY 02-03)

Table 2 shows the breakdown of full-time equivalent positions lost due to employees being out on workers’ compensation. These figures are based on 261 workdays a year (a calendar year minus 104 days for weekends).

Table 2: Breakdown by Department of

Full-Time Equivalent Positions Lost Due to Employees

Out on Workers’ Compensation (FY 02-03)

JM: ro/ts