Employment Patterns for
Workers with Accepted Disabling Claims,
Accident Year 1997, Oregon Workers' Compensation System

by Mike Maier

The Department of Consumer and Business Services (the department) analyzed seven years of wage records obtained from the Oregon Employment Department in order to depict pre and post-injury work experience for more than 21,000 Oregonians with accepted workers' compensation claims. These were claims for disability caused by a work-related injury or illness in 1997. This "Research Alert" provides a summary of some of the findings. The results for 1997 injuries are somewhat better than for 1992-1993 injuries (see Return to Work in the Oregon Workers' Compensation System).

Nearly 10 percent of workers disabled by the job in 1997 were determined, during their claim closure, as unable to return to their regular work, due to the severity of their work-related disabilities. For these severely disabled workers, use of vocational assistance and the Preferred Worker Program resulted in higher rates of reemployment following injury, rates half-again higher than for similar workers who did not use these benefits. Among injured workers determined able to return to their jobs, those who had been placed in light-duty work under the Employer-at-Injury Program had the highest reemployment rates. For workers who settled their claim prior to maximum medical improvement ("medically stationary") and claim closure, just over 40 percent were working by 13 quarters after injury. None of these workers received reemployment assistance.

In general, injured workers are eligible for vocational assistance if the permanent disability resulting from the injury prevents reemployment in any job paying at least 80 percent of the wages earned prior to injury. Almost all these workers are also eligible to use benefits provided by the Preferred Worker Program. Less than 3 percent of workers disabled by the job are in fact eligible for vocational assistance. By 13 quarters after injury, workers who completed their vocational assistance plan achieved a 65 percent reemployment rate, compared to the 41 percent rate for otherwise eligible workers who did not complete their plans ("Other"). A likely explanation for the difference in reemployment rates is the greater use of vocational assistance benefits, and to a lesser extent, the greater use of the Preferred Worker Program, by plan completers.

Injured workers who cannot return to regular work-the job at injury or similar work-due to limitations resulting from the injury are identified by the department as Preferred Workers. For analytical purposes, Preferred Workers are those who weren't eligible for vocational assistance. Historically, Preferred Workers use the program's benefits at rates averaging about 25 percent. However, 81 percent of benefit users were reemployed 13 quarters after injury, compared to 57 percent reemployment for Preferred Workers who did not use benefits. For the average Preferred Worker, the six-month wage subsidy and the worksite modification were the most important benefits in terms of expenditures made on their behalf. Employers, of course, benefit from premium exemption and claim-cost reimbursement benefits.

For the roughly 19,000 workers determined able to return to regular work following recuperation from the work-related disability, subsidized light-duty work prior to claim closure became much more prominent. In fact, workers placed into light duty via incentives to employers under the Employer-at-Injury Program fared best, at 77 percent reemployment at 13 quarters after injury. Once again, workers with permanent disabilities had a somewhat higher rate of reemployment than workers with no rated disability. More significantly, workers who settled their open claims by a Claim Disposition Agreement (CDA) appeared to have the worst long-term prospects for reemployment. These injured workers did not receive any return-to-work assistance nor even identification as a Preferred Worker, even though they apparently suffered injuries of a severity comparable to Preferred Workers.

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This web page was last revised: 04/29/2002