A young, immigrant and undocumented worker in an above-average injury job is not a situation anyone would prefer to be in. 

A recent report zeros in on some of these workers. This month, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and the American Society for Safety Engineers published a report on construction injury risks. The title, Overlapping Vulnerabilities, refers to overlapping risks of young immigrants working in small construction firms. 

The vast majority of immigrant construction workers in the U.S. are Hispanic, with most of them of Mexican origin. An additional risk factor is undocumented status.

It’s worth noting that the demographic profile of immigrants has changed, driven in large measure by new trends of who is entering the country. From 1970 through the mid 2000s, Hispanic immigration surged to the point where one out of every 10 Mexicans that resided in this country was undocumented. Michael Flynn of NIOSH says that at any time, one-fifth of Mexican children has a father working in the United States.

In the past few years, Hispanic inflow declined by two-thirds, while Chinese and Indian immigration grew. More Chinese entered in 2013 than did Mexicans, somewhat over 100,000 from each country. (Total immigration from all regions tends to hover around one million a year.)

At the same time, American-born Hispanics began to outnumber foreign-born Hispanics in the workforce.

Yet there remain very roughly 10 to 15 million foreign-born workers in above-average risk jobs, and the authors of the study are correct in shining a light on some of them. Construction trade work fatalities are heavily skewed to foreign-born Hispanic workers. In the entire workforce, foreign-born Hispanics account for 8% of the workforce but 12% of fatalities. In the construction trades, foreign-born Hispanics accounted for 20% of the workforce but 29% of all fatalities in 2013. (Construction trade workers are in several industries besides construction.)

Looking for explanations for the high rate of construction deaths, the authors cite poor knowledge of safety standards, poor safety training and language barriers.

They bring into the picture the relatively poor injury experience of small construction firms. Close to half of construction deaths are to workers in firms with 10 or fewer employees. They also refer to young workers, saying that 15- to 24-year-old workers have double the injury rate of older workers.

While the data do not fit as neatly together as the authors likely wanted, an abundance of observations on the ground strongly argues the case that young, undocumented Hispanics working for small construction companies are at a far higher risk of injury, when compared to native-born white workers with the same level of formal education, which is high school completion or less, and with far greater job choices.

This chasm has been around for decades. I cannot find evidence that it’s been lessening. It will not until there is substantive immigration reform – the single greatest improvement in work safety available today.

The report focused on construction, but it could well have addressed another sector. My estimates of the nonfatal lost time compensable injuries in America led to the table below.  In farming and hospitality (mainly lodging and restaurants), immigrant workers probably incur a larger share of these injuries than do native-born workers. In the table, "institutional" primarily means real estate.   

A lot of effort is made by OSHA and others to improve safety conditions of immigrant workers through translation and special training projects. I had a chance to review them while preparing Work Safe, a practical guide to employers on safety and health of culturally diverse workforces.

But safety for these immigrants in higher risk jobs will not meaningfully improve until immigration reform is passed. That will wake up employers to their responsibilities and wake up workers to their rights.

Peter Rousmaniere is a consultant for workers' compensation claims administrators and vendors and a veteran observer of workers' compensation industry trends.