Compare occupational injuries using matching definitions
Why can the occupation with more deaths have a lower fatal-injury rate?
Counts describe recorded cases; rates relate cases to hours worked. Seventeen rows now have matching 2024 BLS fatal rates and counts, while five remain unavailable. All nonfatal indices, event shares and hazard labels are separate illustrative legacy scenarios, not verified CFOI or SOII findings.
The five unavailable fatal rows have missing or mismatched source definitions; they are not zero. The nonfatal field has no verified case definition, worker coverage or year. Event shares are illustrative and do not explain the sourced fatal rates. Occupational averages cannot predict personal risk, determine causation or substitute for workplace hazard assessment.
Try a worked example
Suppose one hypothetical occupation has 100 fatal injuries over 2 billion hours and another has 20 over 100 million hours. Using the BLS hours-based formula, the first rate is (100 / 2,000,000,000) × 200,000,000 = 10 per 100,000 full-time-equivalent workers; the second is 40. The first group has five times as many deaths but one-quarter the rate. These invented inputs explain the denominator and are not occupation data.
Read counts and fatal rates separately
BLS CFOI calculates hours-based fatal-injury rates using matching fatal injuries and hours worked. The scaling base is 200 million hours, corresponding to 100,000 full-time-equivalent workers working 2,000 hours each. A rate is not a raw headcount, and the numerator and denominator must describe the same worker group. BLS CFOI: fatal-injury rate calculation
To verify a displayed occupation, identify the reference year, Standard Occupational Classification code, ownership coverage and rate table. Compare the same definition across years, and check revisions and classification changes. A selected subset's top ten is not necessarily a ranking of all occupations. BLS: current and revised fatal-injury tables
The source reports 2024 data, released February 19, 2026. Logging workers had 51 recorded fatal injuries and a rate of 110.4; driver/sales workers and truck drivers had 950 and 25.7. The national row combines the separately published total count of 5,070 with the rate of 3.3. The rate numerator excludes workers under 16, volunteers and resident military, so do not reverse-calculate national hours from the total census count. BLS: selected-occupation fatal rates and counts, 2024 BLS: 2024 CFOI release, February 19, 2026 BLS CFOI: fatal-injury rate calculation
Check the nonfatal case definition
SOII estimates nonfatal injuries and illnesses from employer reports. Its coverage differs from CFOI: it excludes groups such as the self-employed and federal-government workers. A nonfatal series also needs a case definition, such as days away from work or days away, restriction or transfer; a generic Non-Fatal label does not identify the series. BLS SOII: survey scope and nonfatal case definitions
The retained nonfatal_rate key now represents only an illustrative index: it is not a sourced rate per 10,000 and should not be compared numerically with the fatal rate. A verified SOII rate would need its own reference period, coverage and case definition. No ratio here estimates the chance of an injury becoming fatal.
Understand selection, filters and event shares
The fatal chart omits unavailable values; the full table retains all 22 rows and displays Unavailable. Top ten ranks only sourced occupation rows in this stored subset, excluding the national row. The nonfatal index view includes all scenario rows. Selecting a row moves the previous first selection into the second slot. Exports retain the filtered set, including unavailable rows as nulls or blank CSV cells.
The violence preset uses an illustrative share of at least 4%; the violence filter uses at least 10% or a hazard-label match. Transportation and falls filters likewise use legacy thresholds and labels. These are scenario selectors, not verified event findings or causal analyses. Missing fatal data does not invalidate selection of an illustrative pattern, but cannot enter a fatal-rate ranking.
Use official tables for a decision
Open the official tables to confirm the data year, occupation code and event definition. Record the table title and retrieval date beside any figures you reuse. Keep unverified fields separate from sourced values; neither a downloadable file nor a polished chart establishes provenance. BLS: current and revised fatal-injury tables
JSON includes fatal reference year, source and status for each filtered row. Unsupported old fatal numbers are retained only in legacy_unverified fields for traceability; current rate and volume are null. CSV includes fatal source/status and labels scenario columns explicitly, but omits the other-event share. Reset restores the debate preset, fatal-rate view and police/truck comparison; there is no saved comparison import.
Sources and further reading