The OSH Act covers all employees and their employers in the 50 states and all territories and jurisdictions under federal authority. As defined by the OSH Act, an employer is any “person engaged in a business affecting commerce who has employees, but does not include the United States or any State or political subdivision of a State.”
The OSH Act does not cover the following:
- The self-employed.
- Immediate members of farming families that do not employ outside workers.
- Employees whose working conditions are regulated by other federal agencies under other federal statutes. These include mine workers, certain truckers and rail workers, and atomic energy workers.
- Public employees in state and local government. However, a state can develop its own OSHA-approved occupational safety and health program of the private sector.
In cases where another federal agency regulates safety and health working conditions in a particular industry, OSHA standards still apply if the other agency’s regulations do not address specific working conditions.
