Workers' Compensation Insurance

Abstract Although some of the earliest workers' compensation systems were in Europe, many countries now have included recompense for worker injury into social welfare programs. Currently the largest system for which employers purchase private insurance for this matter is in the United States, and this will be the focus of this article. Each state has its own system, so some differences among these will be addressed. State workers' compensation systems developed in the early twentieth century to replace negligence liability for workplace accidents and illnesses. The development of workers' compensation rates by class and state sparked the emergence of the Casualty Actuarial Society (CAS) in 1914.