When Pérez’s partner sought death benefits from G-4 Services, the local staffing contractor that had hired him to work for Thoma-Sea, G-4 rebuffed her. “Pérez was a self-employed independent contractor and thus a claim for death benefits is not compensable,” a lawyer for the company wrote in May. G-4 contends that Pérez “wasn’t working at the time of his death” even though his corpse was found in the ship with his welding equipment.
[...]
Employers with federal contracts are supposed to ascertain workers’ eligibility — and ensure subcontractors do the same — using the government’s online E-Verify system, which checks identity information like Social Security numbers against federal databases. But experts say E-Verify makes it easy for workers to provide false information, and government agencies rarely monitor compliance with these rules.
[...]
G-4 is disputing the benefits claim, citing Peréz’s ineligibility as an independent contractor, saying his partner was ineligible because they were not legally married, and claiming the sudden death of a healthy 20-year-old was not caused by his job. His death, a medical review conducted at the request of G-4 argued, “occurred while he was working but was not caused by workplace related factors or activities.”
So the problem here is a shady subcontractor company which hires undocumented immigrants as "independent contractors", and probably doesn't keep track of whether those workers are working on federal contracts or not, and they're not being audited. These workers are probably uninsurable without valid documentation, so the company will do whatever it can to avoid having to pay out any benefits because they can't actually carry legitimate insurance.
The solutions are:
- Increase the oversight on such companies and enforce rules about identity verification.
- Close the "independent contractor" loophole, forcing all workers to be fully documented and insured through their companies.