Driscoll Agrees with the Larson Standard, Then Affirms Without Needing It The Iowa Court of Appeals has affirmed the denial of workers’ compensation benefits to a city employee who developed...
Issue Commentary: Iowa Looks at Vaccine‑Injury Compensability—and Leaves the Real Question for Another Day Issue Commentary: Iowa Looks at Vaccine‑Injury Compensability—and Leaves the Real Question for Another DayDriscoll Agrees with the Larson Standard, Then Affirms Without Needing It The Iowa Court of Appeals has affirmed the denial of workers’ compensation benefits to a city employee who developed...
Issue Commentary: Iowa Looks at Vaccine‑Injury Compensability—and Leaves the Real Question for Another Day Issue Commentary: Iowa Looks at Vaccine‑Injury Compensability—and Leaves the Real Question for Another DayA Trial Court Found Permanent Total Disability. The Scheduled Injury Statute Said Otherwise. The Alabama Court of Civil Appeals has affirmed a judgment limiting an injured worker to scheduled-member benefits...
Issue Commentary: Alabama’s Scheduled Injury Ceiling and the Cost of a Conclusive Presumption Issue Commentary: Alabama’s Scheduled Injury Ceiling and the Cost of a Conclusive PresumptionCourt Applies Massachusetts Law to Maine Injury, Rejects Immunity Defense in Multi-State Staffing Arrangement A New Hampshire contractor that likely would have enjoyed workers’ compensation immunity under Maine law lost...
Maine Supreme Court: Massachusetts Law Strips Staffing Client of Workers’ Compensation Immunity Maine Supreme Court: Massachusetts Law Strips Staffing Client of Workers’ Compensation ImmunityCalifornia workers' compensation costs per claim rose 6 percent in 2025, continuing a pattern of sustained growth that began in 2022, with all three major cost components contributing to the...
California Workers’ Comp Costs Continued Upward Trend in 2025, WCRI Study Finds California Workers’ Comp Costs Continued Upward Trend in 2025, WCRI Study FindsDOJ Moves Marijuana to Schedule III, but Practical Effects Remain Uncertain In a development that may have implications for workers’ compensation claims involving medical marijuana, the U.S. Department of Justice...
Federal Reclassification of Marijuana: A Development to Watch in Workers’ Comp Federal Reclassification of Marijuana: A Development to Watch in Workers’ CompMedical provider networks now dominate the delivery of care in workers’ compensation. In most states, the majority of medical dollars flow through them. Yet for all their ubiquity, clear evidence...
What Do Provider Networks Actually Do? WCRI Offers Some Answers What Do Provider Networks Actually Do? WCRI Offers Some AnswersThe Statutory Employee Problem in Numerical-Minimum Cases A recent Virginia decision raises a question that courts applying workers’ compensation numerical-minimum statutes have rarely paused to examine: when subcontractor workers are...
Issue Commentary: Counting Heads or Counting Employees? Issue Commentary: Counting Heads or Counting Employees?The Supreme Court of Kentucky has affirmed a finding by the state’s Court of Appeals that summary judgment was improper in a negligence and products-liability action alleging mesothelioma caused by...
Issue Commentary: Take-Home Asbestos and the Reach of Exclusivity Issue Commentary: Take-Home Asbestos and the Reach of ExclusivityEvery dollar spent on workers’ compensation falls into one of two broad categories: benefits paid to injured workers—medical care and wage replacement—and the costs of delivering those benefits. The second...
New York’s Hidden Cost Problem: WCRI Examines the Price of Delivering Benefits New York’s Hidden Cost Problem: WCRI Examines the Price of Delivering BenefitsPA Supreme Court Addresses Scope of Co-Employee Immunity In Brown v. Gaydos, 2026 Pa. LEXIS 267 (Pa. Feb. 18, 2026), a divided Pennsylvania Supreme Court affirmed the Superior Court’s reversal...
Issue Commentary: Where PA Worker’s Injury is Compensable, Does That Automatically Mean Co-Employee is Immune from Tort Liability? Issue Commentary: Where PA Worker’s Injury is Compensable, Does That Automatically Mean Co-Employee is Immune from Tort Liability?Arkansas Court Reverses Commission and Applies Increased-Risk Analysis A ranch hand who developed alpha-gal syndrome (AGS), a tick-borne allergy, after years of outdoor work in tick-infested conditions has had his...
Issue Commentary: Tick-Borne Alpha-Gal Syndrome Claim Reinstated Issue Commentary: Tick-Borne Alpha-Gal Syndrome Claim Reinstated