All across America, in every state, across industries and occupations, workers are being injured, or killed on the job, or exposed to toxic chemicals from which they are dying.

What has happened to our nation that has allowed corporations and insurers to throw away the lives, the health of so many without caring, without fear of exposure, without being held accountable? It's called Workers' Compensation: the system we thought was there to protect us if we were injured on the job.

The title refers to a workers' compensation system in which worker deaths often cost an employer far...