I read with great interest the editorial about worker’s compensation reform (“How to overhaul worker’s comp,” May 17). The Tribune brought forth many good proposals to alleviate the fact that Illinois is ranked as one of the most costly states in the country to do business in with respect to workers’ compensation.
Obviously, in today’s economy, all enterprises are forced to be cost conscious. When employer costs for worker’s compensation are as high as they are in Illinois, the working man and woman will obviously suffer. As ex-President George Bush said, “When you aim at the big guy, you will probably end up hitting the little guy,” that is certainly true of comp reform in Illinois.
What is absent, though, from the many reforms presented concerning the compensation system is a good hard look at the Illinois Industrial Commission, the state agency that administers worker’s compensation. The commission has always been a bureaucratic, uncaring monolith and a convenient dumping ground for political payrollers of both parties. It has given out more than $4 million over the past years in “professional and artistic” no-bid consulting contracts.
The administrative payroll is staggering, and yet the commission has been cited by Illinois State Auditor General William Holland for a plethora of violations ranging from missing computers to patronage games to failure to collect monies due disabled workers and widows and orphans of Illinois workers killed on the job.
True worker’s compensation reform will never be achieved without a quick and drastic end to the way that the chairman, commissioners, and administration of the Illinois Industrial Commission have been doing business.
