June is National Safety Month. For the American worker, this is a time to celebrate the progress made in employee safety over the past century but also a reminder that there is still much room for improvement. Looking back, some nine million immigrants came to America between 1900 and 1910 seeking better lives and wages. Many found work. Most found harsh workplace conditions and long hours. Deaths were frequent - at least 4,700 died while constructing the Panama Canal, for example. Today,...

When it comes to the compliance risks surrounding retirement plans, companies are “tackling some issues reactively rather than proactively,” according to a new survey by auditor Towers Watson. In fact, just one quarter of executives overseeing benefit plans conduct periodic regulatory compliance reviews. “While most employers are concerned with compliance, many are not taking all the steps available to manage the financial, organizational and other risks created by ineffective plan...

But there is one protective force that she has already created for us when it comes to safeguarding our shores. A new study from the Disaster Research Nexus at the Universiti Sains Malaysia shows that coastal mangrove forests in the tropics can serve as a barrier to slow rushing tsunami waves from destroying property and killing citizens. “Mangrove forests have been observed to play a role in reducing tsunami wave heights if the heights are not too big,” states the report. When it comes to...

As the unemployment rate (hopefully) continues to make a slow recovery towards a less-troubling figure this year, it may have the insurance industry to thank. More than half of all insurance companies plan to add staff in 2012, according to a recent industry labor market study conducted jointly by The Jacobson Group and The Ward Group. Despite the brutal 2011 catastrophe year that decimated profits for many companies, industry optimism is fueled by two factors: a belief that revenues will...

Everybody hated Sarbanes-Oxley in 2002. There was no question that the scourge of white-collar crime — at Enron, at Worldcom, at Tyco, at some other blue-chip company seemingly every month — necessitated regulatory response. But this was too much. This was too wide ranging. This was too onerous. This was too expensive. Well, 10 years later, it turns out that the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which mandated more rigorous accounting standards for all public companies in the United States, helped...