미국 산업안전보건법에서 일반의무조항의 제정배경과 운용에 관한 연구

The primary purpose of the general duty clause is to offer an extra measure of protection to employees in the workplace. Most standards implemented under OSHA are targeted at a specific hazard. The general duty clause, however allows inspectors to citeemployers for exposing its employees to a recognized hazard that has not been specifically addressed in the regulations. Congressintended the general duty clause to be a limited means of advancing the purposes of the OSHAct. But OSHA has not always regardedthe general duty clause as the limited means for protecting the safety and health of employees that Congress intented. OSHA attemptedto expand the scope of the general duty clause, at times improperly, to make it a more flexible enforcement tool. OSHA's interpretationof each of the restrictions on the scope of the clause has changed over the years. In recent years the general duty clause has beenutilized as a sometimes controversial mechanism for enforcement of safety guidelines that have not yet been specifically addressed bystatute or regulation. The most notable example of this was application of the general duty clause to ergonomic hazards