100 Years On: The Cost of Work

A century ago, danger was measured in seconds — the time between blast and collapse.
Today, it’s measured in forms, algorithms, and the invisible pressure to perform.

We began this story where Australia’s industrial heartbeat first took shape — Lithgow, the rugged gateway to the Blue Mountains. Here, the nation’s foundation industries were forged: steel, coal, and cement. From the furnaces of the Hoskins Iron Works to the coal seams that powered our cities, the people of Lithgow built the bones of a modern nation — brick by brick, shift by shift.

Now, the same valleys are turning toward the future — renewable energy, tourism, and heritage renewal. Yet beneath this transformation, one truth endures: workplace safety remains the line between life and loss.

Then and Now

One hundred years on, we’ve never had more data, more technology, or more regulation aimed at keeping workers safe.
And still, people are dying.

According to Safe Work Australia’s 2025 report, 188 workers lost their lives to traumatic injuries in 2024 — most of them men, most from just six industries: agriculture, public safety, transport, manufacturing, health care, and construction. Vehicle incidents accounted for nearly half of all fatalities.

But the greatest shift in danger is now invisible.
Between 2023 and 2024, 146,700 serious injury claims were lodged nationwide. Of those, 12% involved mental health conditions — a 161% increase over the past decade. These claims take five times longer to recover from and cost three times more than physical injuries.

Behind those statistics lies an unspoken epidemic of stress, trauma, and moral injury — harm that leaves no visible scar, but breaks lives all the same.

And now, with claims increasingly processed by algorithmic platforms, each injury risks becoming just another datapoint in a system that learns to optimise delay and denial.

Across the Generations

The danger doesn’t just unfold in space — it unfolds across time and age.
The youngest workers today report some of the highest levels of distress, while the longest-serving workers are increasingly showing up in compensation data.

Between 2017 and 2022, serious mental health claims surged across every age group:

Under 25s rose 43%.
25–34-year-olds jumped 58%.
55–64-year-olds increased 50%.
And 65+ workers — many still working in physically or emotionally demanding roles — almost doubled their claims, up 88% in just five years.

It tells a generational story: younger workers buckle under performance pressure in unstable industries; middle-aged workers bridge reform and redundancy; and older workers bear the accumulated strain of decades of overwork, restructuring, and broken trust.

For too long, Australia has placed unmitigated stressors on its ageing workforce.
The men and women who built the nation’s infrastructure now carry its deepest injuries.
These are not sudden collapses — they are the slow consequences of sustained exposure to systems that never stopped demanding more.

When Law Lags Behind Life

The tragedy runs deeper than the data.
Australia’s workers’ compensation laws were drafted for a world where people retired at 65.
But the workforce didn’t stop there — older workers and women now make up the fastest-growing segments of paid employment.

Yet in most jurisdictions, the law has not kept up:

In NSW, weekly compensation stops one year after reaching retirement age (currently tied to pension eligibility).
If the injury happens after that age, payments last only 12 months — even for severe psychological injury.
Other states follow similar rules, though a few (like Queensland and WA) have removed explicit age limits.
Medical and impairment benefits may continue, but income support — the lifeline that keeps a worker housed and fed — often disappears.

In plain terms, the legislation assumes older Australians no longer work — when in reality, millions do.
We have created a safety net with a hole exactly where our most experienced workers stand.

Where Are We Going So Wrong?

We no longer mine only coal and ore — we mine human endurance.
Workplace safety has become more about compliance than culture, and we are paying the price.

Every checklist and training session misses the human truth:
Injury begins in behaviour — in what we tolerate, overlook, or reward.

If we are serious about safety, we must teach the language of behaviour, not bureaucracy.

Workplaces need cultural programs that coach empathy, communication, and situational awareness — that connect mental wellbeing with physical safety, because one cannot exist without the other.

A New Industrial Revolution

As Australia stands at the crossroads of industrial and energy transition, we must carry forward more than the lessons of the past — we must carry the humanity of the people who built it.

Because every statistic began as someone’s son, daughter, partner, or mate who didn’t make it home.

And 100 years on, that’s not progress.

Data Sources:

Safe Work Australia — Key Work Health and Safety Statistics Australia 2025 (released 17 October 2025)
Safe Work Australia — Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace (2024)
NSW Workers Compensation Act 1987 s 52; icare.nsw.gov.au
Safe Work Australia — Comparison of Workers’ Compensation Arrangements Australia & New Zealand 2021, Table 3.2e