2026-04-06

Body Count

A worker dies every 104 minutes. We name the company. We show the fine. You do the math.

Consumer-facing workplace fatality and safety violation accountability — automated corporate death scorecards, per-company OSHA violation histories, penalty-to-profit ratio analysis, industry danger rankings, state-level enforcement maps, individual fatality memorials, and weekly "verdict dispatches" that name the worst offenders, all auto-generated from OSHA enforcement APIs, BLS Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, and OSHA fatality investigation reports.

Niche Explored

Consumer-facing workplace fatality and safety violation accountability — transforming OSHA enforcement data, BLS fatal injury census, and OSHA fatality investigation reports into an automated, opinionated, data-rich accountability site that names companies, tracks fines, reveals industry patterns, and tells the stories of workers who died.

Existing Competition

Direct Competitors

OSHARecord (osharecord.com) — Database search tool for OSHA inspection/citation data. Functional but dry. No editorial voice, no visualizations, no storytelling. B2B-oriented. No newsletter, no community.
OSHA.gov Fatality Reports — Official government page. Bare-bones list with filters. Unusable for general public. No analysis, no context, no trend tracking.
SmartQHSE (smartqhse.com) — B2B safety compliance statistics pages. SEO-optimized data aggregation. No soul, no accountability angle.

Safety Pro Weekly — B2B safety professional advice. Not data-driven, not consumer-facing.
Worksafe Weekly — Construction safety tips. Low subscriber count.
Jon L Gelman (“Dying at Work — Who’s Counting?”) — Solo author, opinion-focused workers’ comp attorney. Small audience. Good angle but no automation, no data viz.
The Safety Report (BELT) — Neuroscience/leadership angle. Academic tone.

Gap Analysis

Nobody is doing:

Automated weekly dispatches naming worst corporate offenders
Beautiful data visualizations of fatality patterns
Company safety scorecards with penalty-to-revenue ratios
Per-industry death rate trend tracking with context
The storytelling of individual workers who died — giving them names
Consumer-facing “how dangerous is your employer” lookup

Data Sources Found

Primary Data APIs

DOL OSHA Enforcement API (developer.dol.gov) — REST API covering inspection data, violation details, penalties assessed vs. paid, company names, SIC codes, inspection dates. Free, no auth required for basic access.
OSHA.gov Bulk Data Downloads (osha.gov/data) — CSV downloads of inspection data, violation data, accident/injury data. Updated regularly. Includes establishment name, address, SIC code, penalty amounts, violation types (willful, serious, repeat, other-than-serious).
OSHA Fatality/Catastrophe Reports (osha.gov/fatalities) — Individual fatality case narratives with company name, incident description, worker age, date. Scrapeable with structured filters.
BLS Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries (CFOI) — Annual data: 5,070 deaths in 2024. Breakdown by industry, occupation, event type, demographics, state. Bulk tables downloadable.
BLS Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses (SOII) — Non-fatal injury/illness rates by industry, establishment size, case type. Annual data.
OSHA Severe Injury Reports — Since 2015, employers must report severe injuries (amputations, hospitalizations, eye loss) within 24 hours. Data available via OSHA.gov.

Supplementary Sources

SEC EDGAR filings — For publicly-traded companies, compare OSHA fine amounts to corporate revenue/profit. Shows absurdity of penalty amounts.
NIOSH Workplace Safety & Health Topics — Research summaries by hazard type.
BLS Quarterly Census of Employment & Wages (QCEW) — Employment counts by industry/state for rate calculations.
OSHA News Releases RSS — osha.gov/news/newsreleases — real-time enforcement action announcements.

Data Quality & Frequency

OSHA enforcement data: Updated continuously as inspections close. ~30,000-35,000 inspections/year.
BLS CFOI: Annual release (February for prior year data). February 2026 released 2024 data.
OSHA fatality reports: Published within weeks of investigation completion.
OSHA news releases: 2-5 per week, covering major enforcement actions.

SEO Analysis

Keywords with opportunity:
- “OSHA violations by company” — high search intent, competitor content is weak
- “workplace deaths 2024/2025” — seasonal spikes around BLS data releases
- “most dangerous jobs” — evergreen, high volume, existing content is listicle garbage
- “OSHA fines for [company name]” — long-tail, extremely high intent
- “Amazon warehouse injuries” / “Tesla factory safety” — branded queries with massive interest
- “construction worker deaths” — high volume, emotional, underserved
- “workplace safety by state” — state-level pages create massive SEO surface area
Content gap: Nobody is creating rich, auto-updated pages for individual companies with their full OSHA history. This is a massive long-tail opportunity — every company with violations becomes a rankable page.

Communities

r/OSHA — 2.7M members. Dark humor about safety violations. Massive engagement.
r/antiwork — 2.6M members. Worker rights, corporate accountability. Perfect audience.
r/Construction — 500K+. Direct industry interest.
r/legaladvice — Workplace injury questions are extremely common.
Twitter/X #WorkplaceSafety — Active community of labor reporters, union organizers, safety advocates.
Labor union social media — SEIU, AFL-CIO, Teamsters all share workplace safety content.

Image/Graphic Feasibility

Highly feasible: This niche is perfect for auto-generated data viz:
- Choropleth maps (fatality rates by state)
- Bar/line charts (industry death trends, penalty trends)
- Company scorecards (penalty amounts, violation types, comparison to revenue)
- “Death clock” counters (worker dies every 104 minutes)
- Treemaps (fatalities by cause: falls, transportation, violence, exposure)
- Individual fatality memorial cards (name, age, occupation, date, cause)
D3.js, Chart.js, or Recharts for interactive charts
Mapbox/Leaflet for geographic visualizations
Satori/og-image for social sharing cards with per-article stats

Key Statistics (from research)

5,070 workers died on the job in 2024 (BLS CFOI)
A worker died every 104 minutes in 2024
Fatal injury rate: 3.3 per 100,000 FTE workers
Transportation and material moving: 1,391 deaths (most of any occupation)
Hispanic/Latino workers: 1,229 deaths, 68.5% were foreign-born
OSHA has ~1,850 inspectors for 130 million workers
Average OSHA fine for a serious violation: ~$16,000
Maximum willful violation penalty: $161,323 (2024)
Many companies pay pennies on the dollar after settlement