An overhaul of the state's workers' compensation benefits moved one step closer to becoming law on Tuesday, May 31 when the House voted with 102 in favor and 12 opposed after its second reading. A final vote before the bill heads to the Senate is expected for later in the week.
The bill would cap disability benefits for most North Carolina workers injured on the job at just over 9-1/2 years instead of the “lifetime” benefits currently available.
In an earlier version of the bill, workers with specific severe injuries such as the loss of both hands, both eyes or paralysis were eligible for an exception to the cap. The version the House voted on today includes a provision for “extended compensation” to expand the exception of the benefit cap to workers who can prove that they have lost their wage earning capacity.
The bill also expands employers' access to an injured worker's doctors and sets out a process that employers must follow. For example, employers that want to talk to an employee's physician must give the worker prior notice, and the employee has the right to sit in on the meeting.
Other than the cap in benefits, the bill would expand benefits to injured or deceased workers' dependents from 400 to 500 weeks. Burial expenses for workers killed on the job would increase significantly, from $3,500 to $10,000.
Should it be signed into law, the bill would also extend benefits for workers with partial incapacity who are physically unable to perform their old job and end up taking another at lower pay. The bill would extend the benefits, which call for workers to receive two-thirds of the difference between their old wages and their new wages, from the current 300 weeks to 500 weeks.
Industry argues the current system has been discouraging workers from taking a lower-paying job because they balked when they compared 300 weeks of benefits to the potential for unlimited benefits. The bill would eliminate that disparity by capping the previously unlimited benefits at 500 weeks while extending benefits for those with partial incapacity to 500 weeks.
The cap puts North Carolina more in line with surrounding states. South Carolina and Virginia also have 500-week caps, while Tennessee and Georgia limit benefits to 400 weeks.
