Environmental Justice and Health: An Analysis of Persons of Color Injured at the Work Place
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
2-2010
Abstract
Occupational and environmental hazards have a direct impact on people of color lives. People of color are disproportionately employed in the dirtiest and low-paying jobs in the United States. This study investigates workplace safety for persons of color from the analysis of three personal injury cases. These personal injury cases include two African-American females and one African American male who were killed or severely injured as a result of their job or the type of transportation they used trying to get to their place of work. The authors use the Environmental Justice Framework to examine how persons of color are affected by injuries caused either by using public forms of transportation trying to get to work and injuries sustained within the job they do at their place of work. A qualitative analysis was applied to the three personal injury cases. Results are reported by each individual case situation. The authors present five policy recommendations for workplace safety for persons of color.