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Outputs
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Xiuwen (Sue) Dong, DrPH
CPWR
Ph: 301-578-8500 ext.8528
Email: sdong@cpwr.com
Year One:
In Year One, this project focused on trends in safety and health disparities during the current economic downturn. Major findings are published in Data Briefs on the CPWR website under What’s New.
Hispanic Employment during the Economic Downturn
- Hispanic employment in construction grew from 646,000 in 1992 to nearly 3 million in 2007, and then in 2008-2009, shrank by 719,000.
- Foreign-born workers accounted for most of the workforce
growth and decline in construction. Hispanic immigrant workers increased from 0.4 million in 1992 to 2.3 million in 2007, then declined to 1.6 million during the economic downturn. By contrast, native Hispanic employment in construction was relatively stable for this period.
Health Insurance among Hispanic Construction workers
- About 64% of Hispanic construction workers did not have health insurance in 2008, compared to 23% of their white, non-Hispanic counterparts.
- Nearly 75% of unionized Hispanic construction workers had
health insurance through their employment, compared to only 24% of non-union Hispanic workers.
- In small construction establishments with 1-10 employees, only 18% of Hispanic workers had employment-based insurance.
Fatal and Nonfatal Injuries among Hispanic Construction
Workers, 1992-2008
- The rate of fatal injuries for Hispanic construction workers was about 41% higher than white, non-Hispanic workers in 1992 -2006, but the rates appear to have converged in 2007-2008. No disparity was found in nonfatal injuries from the BLS data.
Nonfatal Injuries among Hispanic Construction Workers
- This study of Medical Expenditure Panel Survey data found that
Hispanic construction workers were more likely than their white, non-Hispanic counterparts to suffer medical conditions from work-related injuries. This suggests underreporting in nonfatal injuries captured by BLS.
The findings were published in the American Journal of Industrial Medicine (2010;53(6):561-9). View the abstract via PubMed.
Research Team: Xuanwen Wang, PhD, and Christina Daw, PhD.
Abstract:
This two-year project is to identify the root causes of safety and health disparities that are emerging in the construction industry. This study will target Hispanic construction workers, with a special emphasis on new immigrants and those employed in low-skill and high-risk occupations. Several nationally representative data sources will be used for the data analysis, including the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), the Collaborative Psychiatric Epidemiology Surveys (CPES), and a set of the National Surveys of Latinos (NSL). Hypotheses generated from our previous studies will be tested with rigorous statistical methods. Discrimination, health behaviors, and work organization factors that may be leading or lagging to safety and health disparities among construction workers will be investigated for the first time. Findings from this study will serve as a guide for targeted interventions of vulnerable subpopulations within the construction industry.
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