"Nearly half of the workers suffering silicosis in the UCLA and UCSF study said their workplaces were using water to control dust. Roughly a quarter said they always had respiratory protection. Fazio said studies have found that in many shops, dust is so thick in the air that respirators cannot filter out a sufficient amount.
Metzger argued that the kind of sophisticated and costly measures that would be needed to reliably protect workers cutting engineered stone are not economically plausible in an industry where immigrant workers typically labor in small shops and are often paid in cash. Engineered stone "is too dangerous to be used safely," he said. "If there’s any industrial product that should be banned, this is the product.""
All this thanks to synthetic stone - important note for countertops owners, if you want to make sure you don't support the product
>dust is so thick in the air that respirators cannot filter out a sufficient amount
This is not a technology problem, this is an 1880s "Safety devices are too expensive problem" along with paid under the table workers problem. All kinds of other industries manufacture 'dangerous' products with regulations that protect the workers. Housing and agriculture are both industries that do not and fight ever further for anti-regulations to protect the workers even less.
Removing the availability of cheap labor by providing more worker rights, and less/no criminalization of undocumented immigrants alongside an h1b reform would do wonders for the general health of this society.
Nobody is against cheap workers paying taxes. They’re against undocumented workers getting paid under the table and unfairly competing with documented workers that have to pay taxes and thus are more expensive. Gotta solve the documentation problem one way or another.
Once illegal immigrants gain citizenship and essentially basic civil rights (being a criminal federally isn't really freedom no matter if your state is sort of cool about it or not) they will no longer be willing to work in these conditions. They don't report or sue now due to their status, people fear deportation and it's often used as a threat by business owners and housewives employing cleaners and nannies.
Observing public discourse regarding illegal immigration offers great insight into how the Overtone window works and how it can be pushed in any direction by elite-owned media. What is essentially illegal is now being called undocumented. It blows my mind. I had to go over a lot of hoops to be allowed to move to and work in Switzerland. It's the right of the host to set the rules and enforce them. If you don't intend to respect that and still come you're doing something illegal.
And I've been an expat in multiple countries for the majority of my life. Undocumented just means you broke the law to get in. This is illegall. Let's call a spade a spade.
Because being “undocumented” isn’t actually “illegal”.
Heck undocumented is a bad term too on its own but for other reasons.
Being in the US without a right to be in it, is a civil matter. Not criminal. It hasn’t been a criminal matter, and there are actually proponents of making it a criminal matter because then these folks would get actual representation in court.
Second, even if being in the US without the right to be in it becomes a criminal matter, you are still innocent until proven guilty. There are thousands of people who may not be able to produce evidence that they have a right to live in the US.
What Switzerland does has no place in this discussion either.
Anyway now that you know illegal is a factually wrong term, are you going to stop using it?
> What Switzerland does has no place in this discussion either.
Why?
I'm from EU; most countries here will require you to go through some legal process to become eligible to live and work there if you're from outside of EU. This is absolutely normal and expected.
Your argumentation is not only wrong, it would be impossible to maintain peace if crossing the border without any authorization was allowed. Can you imagine the number of Russian spies and saboteurs Poland would have to deal with if the borders were just open to everybody? It would be lunacy to allow that.
> Anyway now that you know illegal is a factually wrong term, are you going to stop using it?
It's not factually wrong. In most places in the world it's literally illegal to cross the border without a visa or other permit. You will get detained and expelled for doing that; and for a good reason.
That you might not like it and prefer to call it some other term doesn't change anything.
Russian spies are literally already within the American political system.
We weren’t able to stop spies during the height of the Cold War. We won’t now. Emotional arguments that point at a random unsubstantiated threat doesn’t actually help this discussion.
Switzerland isn’t relevant in this discussion because we’re talking about the US. They’re not nearly in the same situation or league to be compared.
And again, illegal is really mainly for criminal matters. Not civil. You can keep using whatever word you want but calling it a conspiracy that “big media” is doing is just plain wrong.
It's amazing how you avoid all the points I'm making. I've been in discussions like this too many times. There's no value in dragging it any more at this point. Thank you for your comments, but I'd rather put my energy into more constructive discourse.
The word “illegal” applies to both civil and criminal matters. The presumption of innocence doesn’t apply to civil matters. More importantly, labels generally refer to actual facts. You can talk in general about “speeders” or “shoplifters” though obviously the police would have to prove any individual person accused of those things was in fact doing so.
Paradoxically there is probably no other developed country where finding work as an un undocumented illegal immigrant is easier than in the US. While immigration laws there are very strict by western standards.
How are you going to have “more worker rights” when your workforce is desperate, poorly educated immigrants who come from countries with no labor or workplace safety protections? Counter cutting is a custom business—these aren’t mega corps you can easily regulate. Did you know that this was even a problem until you read this article? Do you think do gooders can be everywhere to observe this sort of thing and bring it to the authorities? Do you think legislators are going to care about this issue when it only affects undocumented immigrants who can’t vote? (Or are you suggesting that people should be able to vote the minute they come over the border?)
There is a deep and fundamental link between having a native born workforce that is educated in this country and socialized to expect certain minimum standards, and the ability to legislate and enforce increased worker protections.
They already have legal protections for this. The problem is the workforce is poorly educated immigrants who, who are fleeing desperate circumstances and have different expectations compared to native born Americans. They’re much less likely to strike to demand better conditions when they’re just grateful things are better than in back home.
A friend is in the countertop business in Florida. We just transitioned his shop to primarily rely on refurbed FANUC robotics performing the heavy lifting and cutting ops to prevent these health hazards (as he’s the one doing the cutting). Work areas are operated in lazy negative pressure with work atmosphere filtered prior to exhaust out of the building.
Regulation is the only way to prevent labor from being treated as disposable by these businesses, regardless of the status of these workers.
It seems that the synthetic stone is not the cause, but highlighting the problem: poor enforcement of safety standards and inadequate PPE provided to workers.
Just because there's more silica doesn't mean that it's suddenly unsafe whereas cutting granite is safe. Even drywall or cutting concrete you're supposed to wear PPE.
It never leaves your lungs though. In the last 20 years we went from "dust masks are for wimps" to "wow not wearing PPE is terrible". One small silver lining of covid is that even relatively oblivious home owners even wear PPE for small projects now. Smoking OR inhaling large amounts of dust might not kill you, but both are bound to make you miserable later in life. There is already a steep drop off in lung cancer deaths, peaking in the early 1990s. Right now we're down to about 1930s level despite having nearly triple the population.
You can buy a cheap yet very comfortable 5000 or 7000 series respirator from 3M for about $20 and the "pink pancake" P100 filters are another $12. If you're a hobbyist those ought to last you a year, maybe even 5 depending on what you're cutting. I do metalwork as a hobby and I can definitely feel it in my lungs (and taste it) the next day if the garage door is shut and I forgot to wear the respirator.
Cutting cement boards with a diamond blade is pretty god-awful for your lungs. On the order of few years.
Effects depend on the particle geometry.
But as a general rule of thumb: if it's biologically inert and tough enough to stick around for awhile... it'll just stay in your lungs. E.g. fiberglass, cement, rock, paint.
I wear a respirator a LOT more these days than I did when I was younger.
Anything that contains silica... which includes concrete, practically anything stone based. This has nothing to do with this material being particularly dangerous above and beyond what is expected with any material cutting. You should not be cutting anything at the industrial scale without proper PPE.
The materials are a second order effect. Undoubtedly breathing granite, soapstone or whatever dust isn't good for you either. Maybe it just takes longer to kill you.
I think the issue is that people are opting for "engineered stone" over wooden laminate which doesn't have the same issue.
So whether it is engineered or natural stone the problem is that stone cutting has dust that needs to be dealt with. But the emerging issue is that with the rising popularity of engineered stone, a higher percentage of countertops overall are hazardous to cut.
Isn't soapstone closely related to asbestos? I'd expect it to produce the same type of powder that makes asbestos so dangerous (and on top of silicosis it can give you mesothelioma)
Or why pick any straws unless you have a medical condition that prevents you from just drinking.
We typically order water to drink in restaurants and when it gets to the table, the servers almost always toss some straws on the table. If we say we don’t want them or if we mention when ordering that we don’t want straws, we get looks like we must be some weirdos. Why automatically push straws for everyone?
Only time I want straws is when the drink is too thick to drink by tipping the glass. Like chocolate with quite alot of cream as decoration or some smoothies. Soda with too much ice crush ... just have too much ice.
I find it quite strange for adults to drink with straws. It is a child thing in my world.
This is basically cultural. In my home country straws are basically something small kids use. There are just a few beverages where a straw really adds some value, like some alcoholic drinks with plenty of floating stuff and milk-shakes.
If anything, straws make some stuff TOO easy, like drinking loads of soda while driving, and this is not good for you.
I think that a lot of problems could be solved by people just consuming less of some stuffs, instead of trying to find a technical solution to the present problems of consuming some of that stuff.
I'd like to know as well. When my parents remodeled their kitchen they got some kind of simulated granite aggregate made of recycled material that I believe was fully heatproof and held up very well over the years. But did somebody get silicosis in the process?
They might have, you have no way of knowing whether the factory in which they were made used PPE or not. If they were cheap, probably not, if they were expensive, maybe, or maybe the manufacturer was just pocketing more profit.
Most of these aren’t made in a “factory.” Because countertops are heavy and pretty much all custom sized and shaped, they’re being made in small scale local businesses.
Metzger argued that the kind of sophisticated and costly measures that would be needed to reliably protect workers cutting engineered stone are not economically plausible in an industry where immigrant workers typically labor in small shops and are often paid in cash. Engineered stone "is too dangerous to be used safely," he said. "If there’s any industrial product that should be banned, this is the product.""
All this thanks to synthetic stone - important note for countertops owners, if you want to make sure you don't support the product