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Dying for a job: Avoiding the Blame for Work-Based Fatalities
Do Differences in Economic Structure Affect Fatal Accident Rates?
We have already seen that rates of fatal accidents are higher in the primary and secondary sectors of industry (more on these definitions). It follows then that countries with more highly developed tertiary sectors are more likely to have lower fatal accident rates than countries whose tertiary sectors are less highly developed.
The table below shows the share of total employment taken up by the service sector in a range of countries:
| Country | Service Sector Share of Total Employment (%) |
|---|
| USA | 78 |
| UK | 75 |
| Finland | 65 |
| Spain | 63 |
| Portugal | 56 |
The data above suggest that there is a reasonably strong link between differences in economic structure and rates of fatal accidents at work. The figures for service sector employment in Finland and Spain, though, are similar, so further investigation would be needed here to account for the disparity in rates of fatal work accidents between the two countries. It may well be that there is a much stronger culture of health and safety at work in Finland than in Spain.
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