A research to compare Turkey's occupational health and safety conditions with USA

Occupation is a necessity for mankind since humanity started living in a society and every individual required to provide for themselves and their families. Technological and industrial developments created more dangerous and difficult to work jobs which also threatens the safety of workers. With increasing value of human life in civilized societies, occupational health and safety also gained great importance. However, occupational safety still could not get enough attention and importance due to inadequate attention of employers, reckless behaviors of employees while on duty and Gods will approach of employees in case of incidents. Occupational health and safety can be defined as taking necessary measures to prevent occupational accidents and diseases, and to create safe and healthy work environment. In last 10 years, important improvements are made in Turkey on occupational health and security. The most important one of these improvements is Labour Act of Turkey (numbered 4857) which is put into effect in 2003, together with additional occupational health and safety regulations. Today, new Labour Act of Turkey (numbered 6331) is being put into effect partially since 2012. Some parts of Labour Act 4857 will be in effect until Labour Act 6331 is completely in effect. New regulations targeting to reduce the number of occupational accidents and diseases require many working places to be re-organized. The subject of occupational health and safety is highly emphasized in the United States of America (USA) like in many developed countries. Maintaining the safety of employees has become obligatory in the USA especially after the establishment of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) in 1970. The OSHA published several regulations to maintain the safety of employees and established a system which heavily fines the violators of these regulations. As a result, there is a %30 decrease in occupational accidents in last 10 years according to BSL. This thesis will examine the state of Turkey on the subject of occupational health and safety, the acts in effect, related institutions and implementations. In addition, it will argue about what should be done in the future in Turkey by examining example implementations in the USA and compare the state of subject with Turkey. The purpose of this thesis is to compare the state of Turkey in occupational health and safety issue with highly developed Occupational Safety and Health movement in the USA, to find out deficiencies in Turkey and to make a contribution in the way to meet world standards in occupational health and safety standards.