Workers Comp Zone

A Partner at Boxer & Gerson LLP, Julius Young has practiced worker’s compensation law and social security disability law since 1979. He has represented thousands of individuals who have sustained life-changing injuries or illnesses while on the job. In every case, his goal is to secure the medical treatments his clients need.

April 24, 2018

AN E-MAIL DRAMA

Officials at California’s Department of Industrial Relations authorized a DIR employee to access an e-mail exchange of at least one WCAB commissioner. This story has come to light after a whistleblower provided documents to a number of workers’ comp stakeholders and media outlets last week. The story is covered in a piece today by Workcompcentral […]


April 18, 2018

MORE ON TESLA

Journalists at the Center for Investigative Reporting have recently published an analysis of alleged widespread safety issues at the Fremont, California plant where Tesla cars are built (see link to the article at the bottom of this post). In 2017 I posted on a Worksafe think-tank study analyzing Tesla’s safety record: http://www.workerscompzone.com/?s=Tesla The recent CIR report […]


April 9, 2018

RAND'S REPORT ON THE RETURN TO WORK FUND

RAND has now delivered to CHSWC a draft report on the California Return to Work Supplement Program. The report (see the bottom of this post) on the RTWSP has now been uploaded to the CHSWC website, with public comments due by May 7, 2018. RAND’s Michael Dworsky presented slides and a summary of the draft […]


April 1, 2018

CHRISTINE BAKER RESIGNS

Christine Baker, the Director of the California Department of Industrial Relations, has resigned as of Friday March 30. In a Friday afternoon e-mail to DIR employees, Baker announced that she is retiring. The note does not address whether her retirement is effective immediately nor the factors that led to the decision, be they personal or […]


March 29, 2018

THE OPIOID STUDY

April 1, 2018 is just around the corner. That’s when the new California workers’ comp prescription formulary will take effect for pre-2018 injuries. Under the DWC regs (see link at bottom of this post) doctors are to have filed reports by April 1, 2018 detailing weaning and tapering plans for non-exempt, unlisted or compound drugs. […]


March 22, 2018

FRANK BRASS RETIRES

Frank Brass recently retired from the WCAB after over a decade and a half as a WCAB Commissioner.  The retirement, which occurred at the end of January 2018, has not been widely publicized. Workerscompzone wishes him all the best in his well-deserved retirement. Brass was appointed to the WCAB in 2001 and was reappointed in […]


March 14, 2018

NOT EVEN A MENTION

An eagerly awaited 2018 report on the future of health care in California fails to mention workers’ compensation at all. The report, dated March 12, 2018, is under the aegis of University of California San Francisco and is titled “A Path to Universal Coverage and Unified Health Care Financing in California”. The report, written by […]