Court Opinion

ID: 9568564
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:05:14.008534+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:48:23.246174
License: Public Domain

PHELPS, Chief justice
(specially concurring) .
I concur with the principles of law enunciated in the majority opinion in this case to the effect that if the inability of a person to procure employment is due solely to an injury arising out of and in the course of his employment he is entitled to compensation for whatever loss in earning capacity he sustains as a result of such injury. If, however, the lack of employment is-due wholly to economic conditions or to a change thereof, loss of earnings resulting therefrom is not compensable.
It is my position that under the facts in this case no part of petitioner’s failure to procure work in Kingman was due to abnormal . economic conditions in that community. Petitioner had been steadily employed for a number of years in Kingman as a carpenter. He testified he could have been working every day since his injury as a carpenter if he had not been injured. However, under the decisions of this court the disability of petitioner is not confined to carpentering but the disablement must extend to every kind of remunerative employment.
There is no contention by anyone that petitioner is now able or will ever be able to do carpenter work again. It is the finding of the commission that he
“ * * * is capable of performing services as a watchman, night watchman, custodian, and other light occupations not requiring strenuous physical activity.”
This court will take judicial notice of the fact that Kingman is a town of approximately 3500 to 4000 population. Except for the fact that it is located on a transcontinental highway and on the main line of the Santa Fe Railroad it is several miles distant from neighboring towns. The court will further take judicial notice of the fact that at all times here involved economic conditions all over the country including Kingman are, and have been, good since World War II. Wages have been high and continually increasing each year. Business and employment generally were practically on a norm with what they have been for the past several years. Unemploy*272ment in Arizona at said time was at a minimum.
The evidence discloses that tourist court business, mining, and cattle raising are the principal business resources of the Kingman community. Building construction has been such that petitioner would have been steadily employed as a carpenter had he not sustained the injury in question.
,The commission based its award in this case upon the ground that petitioner was physically able to do- the work of a watchman, custodian or janitor and other light occupations not requiring strenuous physical activity; that he had made no diligent effort to obtain light work and that his loss in earning capacity was due partly to economic conditions and partly to his injury.
Mrs. Nell Clack who has lived in King-man for 35 years and during which time has been engaged in the cattle business and in mining, and C. R. Wright who has been engaged in electrical construction work in Kingman for 25 years both testified that they did not know of any watchman’s job in and around Kingman. Mrs. Clack said that there were no such jobs in the cattle business at any time and that there were then none in the mining business to her knowledge. Mr. Wright did not know of any watchman’s job except the night merchant patrol whose duty it was to check on the doors of the business buildings in King-man during the night. In a community the size of Kingman where everybody knows everyone in town and the nature .of their business, it is my opinion the testimony of these two witnesses does not fall in the category of negative testimony but in my view it is exactly the equivalent of saying there are and were no watchman’s jobs or light work in Kingman.
The finding of the commission that petitioner is able to do janitor work is not supported by the evidence. Petitioner says he cannot do any work that requires stooping, or the use of his right hand. This is. corroborated by the witness White and the medical board. This board found that the use of his right arm caused severe pain and' produced a numbness in his right hand including his thumb and that he had but little grasp in the right hand. This latter defect would clearly make it impossible for him to-do janitor work even if such jobs were available. The state highway department according to the evidence is apparently the only place in Kingman where a custodian is employed. The witness White further testified that he had known of no work in King-man or vicinity since petitioner’s injury which he could do and that if he had known of such work he would have informed petitioner.
It is therefore my view that the evidence clearly shows there were no jobs available in Kingman, the work of which petitioner was physically able to perform and that no-effort he might have made to secure work *273would have or could have resulted in his procuring, such employment
I heartily agree with the majority opinion that the law does not require an injured employee whose injury is found by the commission to be compensable, whose life is deeply rooted in his community, to leave his established home in order to seek employment in other parts of the country with no assurance of success in order to enjoy the benefits of the Workmen’s Compensation Law of this state. But I am afraid the effect of the majority opinion in this case may encourage the commission to require the petitioner to do just that.
It is further my view that the commission erred in finding that economic conditions contributed to petitioner’s unemployment for the reason that there is no substantial evidence in the record from which such an inference can reasonably be drawn. Had there been watchmen’s jobs or other light work in Kingman and vicinity at the time of petitioner’s injury and by reason of an economic recession or depression, such jobs were not available at the time his injury became stationary, then the finding of the commission that economic conditions partially contributed to his unemployment would have been justified. But surely it is not the law that if an employee who is injured by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment happens to sustain such injury in a locality where there is not now, never has been, and in all probability never will be remunerative work available, which he is capable of performing after the injury, the commission can say that his failure to procure employment was due in any degree to economic conditions.
I am convinced that petitioner’s unemployment under the circumstances in this case is due solely to his injury and that such economic conditions as were contemplated in the decisions of this court were nonexistent in Kingman at the time, and that he is entitled to compensation on the basis of total disability.
For the reasons above stated the award should be set aside.