Opinion ID: 1279239
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: effect of post-hand-injury work history and subsequent disabling cancer

Text: As framed in our order granting leave to appeal, the second limited issue reads: (2) given the Workmen's Compensation Appeal Board's finding of partial disability from her 1967 injury, what effect did plaintiff's post-injury work history and the subsequently disabling cancer have on her right to benefits. This second issue breaks down into two subquestions. The first subquestion is whether plaintiff's entitlement to workers' compensation is adversely impacted by the fact that, after her hand injury, plaintiff was given favored work and received wages equal to or greater than those received before the hand injury. The second subquestion is whether plaintiff's entitlement to workers' compensation is affected by the fact that, while employed at favored work, plaintiff contracted cancer, required an operation, and was no longer able to continue with her previous favored work.
We first turn our attention to the subquestion of whether plaintiff's post-hand-injury work and the wages she received therefor adversely impact her present right to benefits. The WCAB answered this question against the plaintiff:  [P]laintiff after becoming partially disabled, worked at favored duty for well over three years without incident until a supervening event occurred, and at no wage loss (she testified deburring and packing paid the same rate). In such situations, the Court of Appeals ( Dalton v Candler-Rusche, Inc, 65 Mich [App] 282 [237 NW2d 290 (1975)]), has most recently directed that our consideration of the wages plaintiff was able to earn post-injury and pre-supervening event is an appropriate measuring device in computing benefits (if any) that are due. Accordingly, on plaintiff's own testimony, she was making no less (actually more) in 1972 than in 1967, and was at that later date entitled to no partial compensation payments. (Emphasis added.) The Court of Appeals upheld the WCAB concluding as follows: In the case at bar, the amount of plaintiff's post-injury, pre-cancer earnings, and her subsequent, intervening disability do not preclude plaintiff from ever receiving compensation for her hand injuries. Her post-injury wages, however, do establish an earning capacity which presumably continues. Plaintiff carries the burden of proving that, because of her hand injuries, her present earning ability is lower than her pre-injury, wage-earning capacity. As plaintiff offered no such proof, the board properly denied benefits. (Emphasis added.) We cannot agree. There is no dispute that the performance of post-injury work at no wage loss precludes payment of disability benefits while that work continues. This result is statutorily directed by MCL 412.11; MSA 17.161 [6] which limits benefits as follows: The compensation payable, when added to his wage earning capacity after the injury in the same or another employment, shall not exceed his average weekly earnings at the time of such injury. This provision was added to the workers' compensation act in 1927 to specifically preclude benefits in the event that an injured employee was working at another job subsequent to the worker's injury which paid comparable or higher wages. Lynch v Briggs Manufacturing Co, 329 Mich 168, 171-172; 45 NW2d 20 (1950); see Geis v Packard Motor Car Co, 214 Mich 646; 185 NW 916 (1921). Under this provision, the employer is permitted to deduct (or set off) from compensation payable the employee's wages or wage-earning capacity after the injury. Lynch, supra, p 172. However, a post-injury wage-earning capacity is established only if a claimant has accepted regular employment with ordinary conditions of permanency. Markey v SS Peter & Paul's Parish, 281 Mich 292, 299-300; 274 NW 797 (1937); MacDonald v Great Lakes Steel Corp, 274 Mich 701; 265 NW 776 (1936). Contrary to the employer's assertions, plaintiff herein did not receive such regular employment. [7] Rather, plaintiff's post-hand-injury employment was factually determined by the WCAB to constitute favored work, and favored work does not establish a wage-earning capacity, Evans v United States Rubber Co, 379 Mich 457, 465; 152 NW2d 641 (1967); Lynch, supra, p 172; Tury v General Motors Corp, 80 Mich App 379, 385; 264 NW2d 2 (1978), lv den 402 Mich 908 (1978). [8] This being the law, we find the Court of Appeals erred in two respects under the instant facts. First, while that Court correctly noted that plaintiff's post-injury, pre-cancer earnings    do not preclude plaintiff from ever receiving compensation for her hand injuries, error is demonstrated in its subsequent and patently contradictory statement that plaintiff's post-injury wages, however, do establish an earning capacity which presumably continues. Such a presumption would only arise from work which establishes an earning capacity. Pulley v Detroit Engineering & Machine Co, 378 Mich 418, 426; 145 NW2d 40 (1966). It is inconsistent to conclude, on the one hand, that favored work does not establish a wage-earning capacity while holding, on the other, that wages earned in the course of favored work do establish a wage-earning capacity, Evans, supra, p 465. Such a finding neither comports with logic nor the rationale behind the rule, see footnote 8, supra. [9] The second error we find in the Court of Appeals opinion is the gratuitous and incorrect statement that: Her post-injury wages, however, do establish an earning capacity which presumably continues. Plaintiff carries the burden of proving that because of her hand injuries, her present ability is lower than her pre-injury, wage-earning capacity. As plaintiff offered no such proof, the board properly denied benefits. This statement is replete with errors of law. In the first place it is based on the erroneous legal assumption that [h]er post-injury wages    establish an earning capacity. As we have just discussed, insofar as plaintiff's post-injury wages were received for favored work, those wages legally could not establish an earning capacity. Since there was no legal post-injury wage-earning capacity there could be no such assumption and, therefore, no continuation of the presumption. Second, in the present context, it is legally and factually incorrect to conclude that [p]laintiff carries the burden of proving that because of her hand injuries, her present ability is lower than her pre-injury, wage-earning capacity. The fact of the matter is that plaintiff had already met her burden of proof. In Michigan disability is defined as the inability to perform the work claimant was doing when injured. 2 Larson, Workmen's Compensation Law, § 57.53, p 10-129; see, e.g., Allen v National Twist Drill & Tool Co, 324 Mich 660, 663; 37 NW2d 664 (1949); Parling v Motor Wheel Corp, 324 Mich 420; 37 NW2d 159 (1949). The fact that the WCAB found plaintiff to be disabled unequivocally established that plaintiff had met her burden of proof as to being disabled; she was unable to perform her pre-hand-injury work. Third, the statement [a]s plaintiff offered no such proof [of wage-earning capacity], the board properly denied benefits is erroneous for several reasons. As indicated, plaintiff had properly offered proofs establishing that she was disabled. The burden of proof as to an injured employee's right to compensation in this jurisdiction is fundamentally satisfied by the same proofs offered to establish disability. `The test of an injured employee's right to compensation is his inability by reason of the accident to work and earn wages in the employment at which he was engaged when injured.' Levanen v Seneca Copper Corp, 227 Mich 592, 601 [199 NW 652 (1924)]. (Emphasis added.) Siebert v Northport Point Cottage Owners' Association, 378 Mich 661, 674; 148 NW2d 790 (1967). The WCAB accepted and found as a matter of fact that plaintiff was capable of performing only favored work. This finding conclusively established that plaintiff had met her burden of proof as to the right of compensation; she was unable to work and earn wages in the employment at which [she] was engaged when injured. Siebert, supra . Because no post-injury wage-earning capacity was established, plaintiff was not faced with a burden to overcome the corollary presumption of continued wage-earning capacity. Therefore, the only remaining burden was on defendants to prove that plaintiff still had a wage-earning capacity. See Hood v Wyandotte Oil & Fat Co, 272 Mich 190, 193; 261 NW 295 (1935); 2 Larson, Workmen's Compensation Law, § 57.51, p 10-122. Fourth, neither the WCAB nor the Court of Appeals in this case appeared to fully grasp three fundamental legal propositions underlying and controlling this case. The first, and perhaps most important, is that the WCAB in finding that plaintiff was capable of performing only favored work had conclusively established plaintiff's disability and right to compensation. Significantly, this right persists unless cut off by a legal bar. The second legal proposition is that only wages from regular employment create a bar; wages from favored work, when actually paid, toll the right to compensation but when no longer paid neither toll nor bar compensation. The third legal proposition is that inability to continue favored work, where that inability arises from a supervening event for which the worker is not responsible, does not create a legal bar. We note that neither the WCAB nor the Court of Appeals shared this Court's express concern about the possible bar of an overlapping cancer redemption. Nonetheless, we have shown that there is in both law and fact no overlap or duplication here that might bar plaintiff's entitlement to compensation. In sum, the fundamental posture of this case is that: (1) plaintiff has established her right to compensation for the work-related hand injury and (2) that right is neither barred by her subsequent favored work wages nor her later inability to continue such favored work because a supervening event not in her control. Further, the redemption of a legally non-work-connected cancer does not duplicate the compensation for a work-connected injury. Therefore, a right to compensation was established and no bar exists to preclude that right.
The final subquestion under the second limited issue is, what effect did plaintiff's    subsequently disabling cancer have on her right to benefits. The answer is that the subsequently disabling cancer had no effect whatsoever on plaintiff's right to compensation for her prior hand injury. The case of Lynch v Briggs Manufacturing Co, 329 Mich 168; 45 NW2d 20 (1950), is directly on point. In Lynch as in the instant case, plaintiff was injured at work in a factory, received total compensation for a period and then returned to favored work at his skilled rate of pay. Thereafter, plaintiff was struck and injured by an automobile while standing in a street car safety zone. Plaintiff was disabled from continuing his favored work. Defendant in Lynch appealed a grant of compensation, averring that Lynch was not entitled to compensation because his present loss of earnings is due to a disability unassociated with his employment, 329 Mich 168, 171; defendant in the instant case similarly argues that since the non-work-related cancer disability has prevented plaintiff from continuing her favored work, her benefits should be barred. This Court in Lynch held: Lynch [plaintiff] at the time of hearing was not physically capable of performing the favored work. He was prevented from doing so by events not under his control. Yet he was still totally disabled in his skilled employment because of his occupational injury of 1946. Supervening events, stopping his favored work and not attributable to him, will not defeat his compensation as a skilled employee. (Emphasis added.) Lynch, supra, 172. See also Hansel v Chrysler Corp, 58 Mich App 173; 227 NW2d 276 (1975); Medacco v Campbell, Wyant & Cannon Foundry Co, 48 Mich App 217; 210 NW2d 360 (1973). [10] Because the above rules are well established, it is difficult to understand the contrary relevance ascribed to the intervening event by the WCAB. The WCAB stated: While she remains partially disabled    an event intervened in no way imputable to the employer, and the law    directs that we award only those benefits to which plaintiff was entitled prior to the larynx cancer interrupted [sic] her work career  in this case, none. [11] The Court of Appeals, however, found the WCAB had erred as to its above finding and stated: An independent, intervening event, which follows a personal injury arising out of and in the course of employment, does not alone justify the denial, suspension, reduction, or increase of disability benefits for a continuing work-related injury. In the present case, plaintiff's throat cancer itself would not alter her right to collect workers' disability benefits if her hand injuries in fact diminished her wage-earning capacity.  (Emphasis added.) We agree with this statement of the Court of Appeals and specifically find that plaintiff's post-hand-injury cancer does not adversely impact plaintiff's present right to benefits. [12]