Evaluate Workers Compensation as it relates to Terrorism

On September 11, 2001, the US was attacked with devastating ferocity as we experienced the largest terrorist attack on native soil in the country’s history.  Among the aftermath of these attacks were the workers and employees injured or who became ill as a direct result of these attacks.  The number of workers compensation claims as a direct result of these attacks was enormous and brought renewed attention to the needs of terrorism training and awareness to business owners of all sizes as well as concern about how to cover these types of large, unanticipated expenses that go above and beyond normal work related exposure.  What is a small business owner to do?

After all, terrorism is certainly beyond the control of large and small companies! As our country began the slow process of sorting through the chaos, among the issues to be handled was that of workers compensation. From its conception, our current workers compensation system was never designed to address the issues faced by employees or employers in the face of terrorism. As the weeks and months went by, our nation was forced to face the fact that the system did not have the resources to fill all the need that resulted from the attack. In 2002, at the urging of insurance industry, the government enacted a federal terrorism program that would serve as a backstop to support the current workers compensation system in the event of a terrorist attack. This program requires the federal government to pay a portion of the cost cause by an attack by foreign terrorists. Once costs exceed $10 billion dollars, the federal government then pays 90% of the cost, to a maximum of $100 billion. The government, will however, pay smaller amounts if losses total less than that.

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