Court Opinion

ID: 9579620
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:56:46.091969+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:35:37.911418
License: Public Domain

Levin, J.
(dissenting). The Worker’s Compensation Appellate Commission found that Joseph F. Michales was disabled pursuant to § 401(1)1 of the Worker’s Disability Compensation Act, and was entitled to weekly wage-loss benefits. The Court of Appeals reversed.21 would reverse, and affirm the decision of the wcac because there is record support for its findings and conclusions.
The wcac adopted the portion of the magistrate’s opinion setting forth unrebutted expert evidence that Michales "experienced a high frequency hearing loss.”3 The wcac said, and I agree, that Michales’ condition amounted to a disability under either the definition in effect before May 14, 1987, or that in effect on and after that date.4
The wcac noted that both the definitions before and after May 14, 1987, provide that " '[t]he establishment of disability does not create a presumption of wage loss,’ ” and said that "indeed plaintiff *497had none until October 24, 1987,” the day after his last day of work.5
The wcac further said, and I agree with its analysis:
Because plaintiff, by virtue of his work-related condition, is excluded from working in a noisy environment, he is limited where he was not limited before the condition developed. Thus he has a compensable disability, a loss in wage-earning capacity because of a work-related condition.
Nor does it matter that nobody should be exposed to the noise that resulted in plaintiff’s hearing loss. With the loss established, and restrictions imposed to prevent further loss, plaintiff is not in the same position as the individual not yet so impaired.
The record establishes that working around loud noises is what plaintiff did during his long tenure at defendant. It was, therefore, work suitable to his qualifications and training. It is no longer suitable. He thus has a limitation in his wage-earning capacity under either definition of disability. [Citations omitted.]
It is beside the point that there is work, within restrictions imposed by his work-related hearing loss, that plaintiff can do without risk of increasing that loss. The Magistrate declined to find that the work plaintiff was doing when he left defendant was not in that category: "We have no way of determining that the present noise levels exceed the noise restrictions suggested by Dr. Henry.” For that reason, as explained earlier, and as a matter of law, a date of injury at some time before plaintiff’s last day worked, but still in 1987, must be assigned, and we proceed on the assumption that the work he did when he left defendant was *498doing him no harm: it accommodated his disability.
While plaintiff could do that work, defendant was entitled to credit for wages earned at it pursuant to the provisions of MCL 418.361 [MSA 17.237(361)]. However, so long as the work-related hearing loss remains, entitlement to weekly benefits remains when plaintiff can no longer do that work. [Powell v Casco Nelmor Corp, 406 Mich 332; 279 NW2d 769 (1979).]
Nor can plaintiff be considered to have voluntarily removed himself from the work force for having left without good and reasonable cause, the employment defendant was providing him. MCL 418.401(3)(a) [MSA 17.237(401)(3)(a)].[6]
Although Michales continued to do his regular job, in the words of the Court of Appeals, after "he sustained a hearing loss,” the hearing loss nevertheless was a "limitation” of his wage-earning capacity.7 The accommodations provided by the employer, Morton Salt, did not eliminate the limitation on Michales’ wage-earning capacity resulting from the hearing loss. The issues of "disability” and "wage loss” are separate questions.8
I would, again, for the reasons stated by the *499wcac, reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals and reinstate the order entered by the wcac.

 MCL 418.401(1); MSA 17.237(401)(1).

 Unpublished opinion per curiam, issued December 29, 1993 (Docket No. 133879).

 1990 WCACO 983, 985.

 MCL 418.401(1); MSA 17.237(401)(1) before and after its amendment by 1987 PA 28, effective May 14, 1987.

 Id at 986.

 Id. at 986-988. MCL 418.401(3)(a); MSA 17.237(401)(3)(a) provides:
If disability is established pursuant to subsection (1), entitlement to weekly wage loss benefits shall be determined pursuant to this section and as follows:
(a) If an employee receives a bona fide offer of reasonable employment from the previous employer, another employer, or through the Michigan employment security commission and the employee refuses that employment without good and reasonable cause, the employee shall be considered to have voluntarily removed himself or herself from the work force and is no longer entitled to any wage loss benefits under this act during the period of such refusal.

 Note 2 supra, slip op at 2.

 There is no need to consider the favored-work doctrine in the instant case.