The system of compensating workers for job-related injuries and illnesses that California created nearly a century ago was a double-barreled benefit for employers. A no-fault system would protect employers from lawsuits that injured workers otherwise might file, and a quasi-public State Compensation Insurance Fund would be an insurer of last resort and thus protect employers from arbitrary rate increases by private insurance firms. What we have now, however, is not your grandfather's workers' compensation system. It's become very litigious and very political, and the State Fund is the insurer of first resort, writing more than half of all coverage. When...
