Latinos account for 41% of New York City’s construction workforce, but an astonishing 74% of construction workers who fell to their deaths between 2003 and 2011 were classified as “Latino and/or immigrant” by investigators, Erica Pearson reports for the New York Daily News. Why is this work disproportionately deadly for Latinos? Experts believe that Latino construction workers, particularly recent immigrants, are more likely to work for non-union companies, including day labor firms, which are more likely to skimp on safety equipment and training. Unscrupulous employers profit from the knowledge that undocumented workers are less likely to complain about all kinds of abuses, from lax safety procedures to wage theft. 

[Photo credit: Vonderauvisuals, Creative Commons.]