Opinion ID: 445029
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Discussion of Collateral Issues

Text: 35 First, the parties agree that if Mr. Henry had survived he would have been entitled to a permanent partial disability award for the loss of his leg below the knee. 29 This would be true even had Mr. Henry returned to work immediately and been compensated at a higher rate than prior to his injury. This result accords with accepted precepts of workmen's compensation law. As Professor Larson states: 36 Permanent partial schedule awards are based on medical condition after maximum improvement has been reached, and ignore wage loss entirely. Fixed payments for loss of specified members are due even if the claimant during the period is back at work at higher wages than before. 37 2 A. Larson, THE LAW OF WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION Sec. 57.13, at 10-24 (1983). 38 The foregoing proposition flows from the fact that compensation for scheduled losses under sections 8(c)(1)-(20) of the LHWCA is based upon a damages concept rather than loss of wage-earning capacity. Although scheduled awards are keyed to pre-injury earnings, no proof of wage loss is required: 39 [I]f the injury is of a kind specifically identified in the schedule set forth in Secs. 8(c)(1)-(20) of the Act, 33 U.S.C. Secs. 908(c)(1)-(20), the injured employee is entitled to receive two-thirds of his average weekly wages for a specific number of weeks, regardless of whether his earning capacity has actually been impaired. 40 Potomac Electric Power Co. v. Director, OWCP, 449 U.S. 268, 269, 101 S.Ct. 509, 510, 66 L.Ed.2d 446 (1980); see also, 2 A. Larson, THE LAW OF WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION Sec. 57.14(c), at 10-35. 30 41 Second, it is uncontested that Mrs. Henry is entitled to receive death benefits under section 9 of the LHWCA regardless of the disposition of the scheduled benefits issue. As noted above, the parties have stipulated that Mr. Henry's injury and death arose out of and in the course of his employment. Section 9 unequivocally provides for death benefits to specified survivors--including the widow--of an employee who dies from work-related injuries. Since Mrs. Henry admittedly is a designated survivor under the statute, appellee does not challenge her entitlement to death benefits. 42 Third, there is no disagreement that section 8 disability benefits are separate from section 9 death benefits. The case law clearly establishes two separate causes of action, one for disability lying with the disabled employee, and one for death lying with specified survivors of the decedent. We affirmed this principle as long ago as 1942 when we held: 43 [D]ependents of an employee whose injury results in death are entitled to death benefits under Section 9, regardless of the compensation paid to him for disability until death; ... a fair interpretation of the Act as a whole demonstrated that Congress had established two separate rights--the one (Sec. 8) compensation for injury payable to the injured employee, and the other (Sec. 9) death benefits payable to his widow and children; and that consequently a partial discharge of one has no effect on the other. 44 Hitt v. Cardillo, 131 F.2d 233, 234 (D.C.Cir.1942), cert. denied, 318 U.S. 770, 63 S.Ct. 760, 87 L.Ed. 1140 (1943). 31 45 More recently, a line of cases has considered the question whether, in a case where an employee was injured before the 1972 amendments to the LHWCA but died after the effective date of the amendments, death benefits should be computed according to the more generous post-1972 LHWCA formula. In all of those cases, employers or insurance companies argued that the injury triggered the application of the LHWCA and, therefore, that the pre-1972 death benefits formula should apply. In every case, however, courts and the Board reasoned that, since death and disability were two separate causes of action, death occurring after the effective date of the 1972 amendments would trigger the more generous benefits available under those amendments, notwithstanding the fact that the injury which caused death occurred prior to 1972. 32 46 This conceptual distinction between disability and death benefits is important to this case because it eliminates the contention that there will be an impermissible double recovery if Mrs. Henry receives both death benefits and Mr. Henry's scheduled award. The contention that this alleged double recovery is impermissible is also belied by Hyman's acknowledgement at oral argument that, if Mr. Henry had lived for several months or years and returned to work at higher pay, he would still have been entitled to his scheduled award. His survivors would nonetheless have been entitled to death benefits as long as he died from his compensable or work-related injuries. Finally, as noted above, the statute itself provides for concurrent payments in the case of scheduled awards and either total or partial temporary disability. 33 47 We also reject Hyman's argument that a disposition in Mrs. Henry's favor here would result in future awards of absurd proportions. Specifically, Hyman poses a hypothetical whereby the wife of an employee who lost two legs and one arm in an industrial accident and died of those injuries two weeks later would be entitled to death benefits and 888 weeks (17 years) of scheduled benefits for the lost limbs and permanent total disability benefits due to the statute's conclusive presumption that loss of two legs constitutes permanent total disability. Brief for Appellee at 7-8. The latter hypothesis is, however, simply incorrect since the statute does not permit scheduled awards to be paid in addition to permanent total disability. See Rupert v. Todd Shipyards Corp., 239 F.2d 273, 276 (9th Cir.1956). As for the multiple awards for loss of limbs where there is no permanent total disability, we simply note that the statute expressly provides for consecutive scheduled awards in section 8(c)(22). 34 Obviously, it is not the province of this court to second-guess legislative judgments on schedules for workmen's compensation awards. Rather, our only legal task is to determine what disability benefits Mr. Henry was entitled to receive, and whether those pass to his survivors under the statute.