Forty years after the passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act), “there is much more work to be done….The job safety laws must be strengthened,” finds the 2011 AFL-CIO annual job safety report “Death on the Job,” released this morning to commemorate Workers Memorial Day. (Click here for the full report.)

In hundreds of events around the nation on Workers Memorial Day, April 28, workers will gather together at worksites, city parks, houses of worship and local and state government offices to remember those who have lost their lives on the job and demand strong safety laws and tough enforcement of those laws.

As we approach Tuesday, April 5, the first anniversary of the deadly blast at Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch (W.Va.) mine that killed 29 coal miners, the nation’s top mine safety official today called for tougher laws and bigger penalties for safety violators.

Ceremonies and events honoring the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist fire that killed 146 garment workers—most of them young women—and spurred the first nationwide call for workplace safety, continue Monday morning with a special online forum that will examine the connection between a voice at work and job safety.

Back when flight attendants were stewardesses and airline ads promoted their good looks and winsome smiles to get you on board, these hardworking airline employees had no job safety and health protection.  Today, flight attendants still are not covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and most of his Republicans colleagues want to keep it that way, just like the old days.

The nation’s No. 1 priority is  getting the nation’s job-creation engine running again. But House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his gang instead have unveiled a budget plan that slams working families and is a “naked payback” to Wall Street CEOs, says AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) wants to deny safety and health protections for flight attendants. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization bill would extend Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) protection to flight attendants and other air crew, something air crew workers have been seeking for decades. Paul has offered an amendment to strip the OSHA protections from the bill. (Click here for details.)

With some 280,000 jobs at stake in the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization bill, you’d think Senate lawmakers would be working together to get those jobs in the pipeline as soon as possible. Not.

It seems simple enough. Employers already keep a record for workplace injuries and illnesses—why not add a column to the report for musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs)—ergonomic injuries? The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) would provide the form and employers would simply put a check mark in the right place to identify which injuries are MSDs. But now OSHA is withdrawing the rule, which applies only to small businesses, from final review to get further input from small businesses.

This is a cross-post from The Huffington Post by Stewart Acuff, Utility Workers (UWUA) chief of staff and assistant to the president.

It is 9 p.m. on a very cold Philadelphia night as I sit down to write this. I’ve just returned from a closed casket viewing of my 19-year-old union brother Mark Keely who was blown up in a gas main explosion three nights ago. Three other union members of his work crew were burned from head to toe.