After advocating for years to improve the state’s business climate, I am pleased to announce that my efforts have finally come to fruition this past week with an agreement between the Governor and Legislative leaders to reform the state’s workers’ compensation system. Many of the reforms included in the agreement are a result of the work done by the Assembly Minority Small Business Task Force, which aims to keep New York competitive in the 21st century economy.

The agreement calls for increasing benefits to injured workers for the first time since 1992, while lowering employer costs by at least 10 to 15 percent, with savings increasing for employers over time. This will go a long way toward improving New York’s workers’ compensation system, which currently has the second-highest cost per case and is ranked 48th among 50 states in benefit levels.

Critical to the reforms are providing cost savings to businesses by capping permanent partial disability benefits, providing continuing medical care, establishing a safety net to assist injured workers’ return to employment and intervening during cases of severe destitution.

In addition, the reforms would increase the current maximum weekly benefit rate for injured workers from $400 to $500, and then provide increases to it over a period of four years that will be equal to two-thirds of the state’s average weekly wage. Further adjustments would be made by indexing the benefits for injured workers to the state’s average wages, continually providing increases to counter the effect of inflation and increased cost-of-living.

Since taking office in 2002, I have been an advocate for cost-saving measures that would help stimulate the state's economic climate, enable businesses to thrive and provide a benefit increase that will improve the quality of life for injured workers. These increases to the benefits and cost-saving measures for businesses are long overdue and necessary to reflect current average wages in New York.