Workers' Compensation and the Rules of Golf
The sport of golf originated in Scotland 400 years ago. It has endured as the purest sport because the ultimate rule in golf is to follow the rules. The idea of cheating is abhorred by tournament and purist golfers. There are no referees because the game is a game of honor and the golfer is on the honor system. He or she is the one who is expected to call an infraction of the rules on himself.
There is no greater humiliation in the professional golf world than to be caught cheating. Any professional golfer who is caught cheating would be shunned by golfing organizations, as well as his or her fellow golfers.
Perhaps the greatest golfer the world has ever known was Bobby Jones. Jones played as an amateur and could not accept any money for any of the tournaments that he won. He played as an amateur because he was a purist. He believed that adding money to the sport would ultimately spoil the purity of the game.
In an U.S Open he called a penalty on himself because he claimed that his ball moved, ever so slightly, in a match against Walter Hagen. The rules official questioned the gallery, as well as Mr. Jones' fellow competitor, who all stated that they didn't see the ball move. Jones was adamant that it in fact had moved and that he would have to incur the penalty, which led to his defeat in the coveted U.S Open.
The story goes that the rules official stated, at the time, that this was the greatest act of sportsmanship in the history of sports and that Jones should be commended for his honesty. To this Jones replied that he was not deserving of such accolade because it would be akin to congratulating the bank robber for not robbing the bank. He stated that it was the "only way he knew how to play the game."
The rules themselves are developed for the purpose of making the game fair and to avoid one player from having an unfair advantage over another.
Imagine if Workers Compensation was practiced with the same integrity as golf. Imagine if the whole world conducted life on that premise.
But real life in America is more akin to sports invented in America. In baseball, football and basketball cheating is expected and applauded. In fact, lying and cheating is an integral part of the game.
Apparently, the American concept of sports has worked its way into the Workers' Compensation system.
First the rules.
As we have seen with the implementation of SB899 the new rules themselves were established by lying and breaking every rule in the book.
The Governor had made campaign promises and assertions that he could not be bought. At the time when he was pushing the so-called Workers' Compensation "reforms" he was receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars from carriers.
The Governor had promised to make California the Sunshine State, implying that the government would be open and honest and that the public would be included in the making of legislation. He criticized the backroom deal making of the Davis administration.
As we know, SB899 was completed in the early morning hours, literally in a back room of a government building.
Instead of legislators giving careful consideration to both sides of the issue, the governor held a gun to the legislature's head and berated them as "Girlie Men" in order to coerce a quick deal. The package presented to the legislature was primarily written by the insurance industry and the reform package essentially set up a system of rules that guarantees the carriers a huge advantage over the injured worker.
The legislation was in response to a so-called crisis and was enacted as an emergency legislation, apparently to resolve the crisis.
This was the big lie.
What exactly was the crisis that required an overhaul of a 91-year-old system of benefits and justice that needed to be put into effect immediately?
The crisis was that workers' compensation insurance rates for employers were so high that employers were going to stop doing business in California or go bankrupt.
No doubt the rates that employers paid were, and still are, among the highest in the country. That fact alone, however, does not establish a crisis. If the whole economy were going to fail imminently if something wasn't done that would be a crisis warranting emergency legislation. Since the passage of SB899, rates have not substantially changed- and the world goes on.
At the time prior to the enactment of SB899, even the governor stated that workers' benefits in California were among the lowest in the land. So the cause of the crisis, if one can really call it a crisis, was NOT the level of benefits that the injured worker received.
The crisis was the rate not the benefits. The solution to the crisis was lowing the rates. If there really was a crisis the first line of SB899 should have stated that insurers must immediately roll back rates to an amount that would avert the crisis.
(How we would deal with the carriers potential demise if this occurred would have been an issue that would have had to been dealt with. Tax relief, grants, wage reductions by the overpaid CEOs whatever was necessary.}
Instead, the governor and legislature approved across the board drastic reductions of benefits and rights of the injured worker without one word about reduction of rates. The rates would come down in a few years if the reforms worked and saved the industry enough money.
That in and of itself proves that there was no crisis to begin with. If we could wait and see how the reforms worked, we could have waited long enough to carefully consider both sides of the equation. The legislature could have had enough time to carefully study the matter so as to implement changes that both reduced costs to insurers and retained an adequate and fair system of compensation and justice.
But, alas, we don't play life and politics by the rules of golf. Rather, the state is run by the American rules of sport which is to lie cheat and steal and win at any cost.
The latest memo by Mr. Sweet is a breath of fresh air. It is akin to the honor and integrity that Mr. Jones demonstrated many years ago when he called a penalty on himself knowing that it would cost him the U.S. Open.
At least someone from the other side understands and appreciates the rules of golf even if he doesn't play the game.
J. Geller
Golfer at Law
April 27, 2005
