Court Opinion

ID: 9854938
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:17:15.880465+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:36.937506
License: Public Domain

GREENE, Judge,
dissenting.
In remanding this case to the Full Commission, the majority accepts defendants’ position that plaintiff’s post-injury overtime hours decreased due to an economic downturn experienced by the company. The majority therefore orders the Full Commission to compare the number of overtime hours available to the present floater, Ms. DeMarco, and those available to plaintiff in her post-injury job as a lab technician in order to determine whether plaintiff suffered a loss in earning capacity. Because I believe this analysis to be an issue that is only reached upon a finding by the Full Commission that defendants have met their burden under Harris v. North Am. Prods., 125 N.C. App. 349, 481 S.E.2d 321 (1997), a finding the Full Commission did not make, I dissent.1
In Harris, this Court held that while an injured employee’s post-injury wages create “a presumption of post-injury earning capacity, the presumption may be rebutted by either party upon a showing that such wages are an unreliable basis for determining the employee’s actual earning capacity.” Id. at 355, 481 S.E.2d at 325. In this case, defendants offered evidence that an economic downturn, resulting in an overall decrease in overtime, caused plaintiff’s post-injury earnings to be reduced. The deputy commissioner found “competent evidence in the record . . . that [plaintiff’s] decrease in earnings following her admittedly compensable injury by accident was due to her having to work in the defendant-employer’s Quality .Control Department which afforded her fewer opportunities to work overtime and thus decreased her earning capacity.” On appeal to the Full Commission, Defendants assigned as error that this finding was “not supported by the competent evidence of [rjecord in that the *605[d]eputy [c]ommissioner failed to take into account the economic downturn, faced by the [d]efendant[-employer] and the effect of the economic downturn on [plaintiffs] ability to work overtime.” The Full Commission, however, implicitly rejected defendants’ argument by adopting the deputy commissioner’s finding almost verbatim. As plaintiff has met her burden of proving a decrease in her earning capacity and defendants have failed to meet their burden of showing plaintiff’s evidence to be unreliable, see id., I would affirm the Full Commission’s opinion and award.

. Only if the Full Commission had found defendants to have met their burden of showing plaintiffs post-injury wages to be unreliable under Harris would the Full Commission have to compare available overtime as outlined in the majority opinion.