Latest OSHA Data Show a Ten Percent Rise in Injuries to Minnesota Amazon Workers

Key Findings

An analysis of the latest available data self-reported by Amazon to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration shows:

• Increasing numbers of worker injuries – Injury rates jumped 10 percent at the company’s warehousing and logistics facilities in Minnesota from 2020 to 2021. The rate increased from 9.4 injuries per 100 full-time equivalent workers (FTEs) in 2020 to 10.3 injuries per 100 FTEs in 2021. In late 2020, Amazon reinstituted electronic monitoring–based disciplinary policies that had been suspended at the beginning of the pandemic, driving up the pace of work and likely resulting in more worker injuries. Amazon’s 2021 total injury rate in Minnesota (10.3 per 100 FTEs) is approximately equivalent to one injury for every 10 full-time workers. All of the injuries reported by the company were serious enough to require medical attention.[1]
• Overwhelming majority of injuries to Minnesota Amazon workers were of the most serious kind. Eighty-nine percent of injuries that Minnesota Amazon workers experienced were cases so serious that workers could not continue performing their normal job duties and had to either change job duties or take time off work to recover.
• The injury rate at Amazon facilities was about 1.5 times that of non-Amazon facilities. In 2021, the total injury rate at Amazon warehousing and logistics facilities in Minnesota (10.3 per 100 FTEs) was 1.5 times that of non-Amazon warehousing and logistics facilities (6.9 per 100 FTEs). This refers to Minnesota establishments that fall under the following North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes: 492110, 493110, 493120, 493130, and 493190.
• Minnesota Amazon workers are injured at a higher rate than Amazon workers nationally. The total injury rate for Minnesota Amazon warehouse and logistics workers in 2021 (10.3 per 100 FTEs) is 30 percent higher than the national average for Amazon warehouse and logistics workers (7.9 per 100 FTEs).

Figure 1.

Source: OSHA Injury Tracking Application and Bureau of Labor Statistics SOII, 2021

[1] Unless otherwise noted, all Minnesota injury rates reported in this brief are based on an analysis of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Injury Tracking Application data, 2021 available at https://www.osha.gov/Establishment-Specific-Injury-and-Illness-Data. These data are self-reported by companies to OSHA. Companies are required to report any work-related injuries that require medical attention, and whether the injury caused workers to miss days of work or require a job transfer.