Minnesotans and people across the country are worried about finding and keeping jobs. Many are desperate for any job at all in the worst recession since the Great Depression. Fifteen million people who want to work are stuck in unemployment lines. Just about as many are working part time when they want to be working full time or have given up looking. So it can be tempting to overlook dangerous workplaces and say now is not the time to prioritize workers’ safety.

But disasters at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, the Tesoro refinery in Washington, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf and other workplaces tell us otherwise. There is never a right time for substandard and unsafe workplaces. Now, when economic conditions and our corporate culture give rise to corner-cutting, is exactly the time to safeguard working people on the job.

Last year, 21 Minnesota workers died

on the job as a result of workplace injuries – these are women and men who go to work,

never to return home to their families and loved ones.

Countless more end up to succumbing to illness and injury later in life from their years of hard work.

These chilling statistics are a stark reminder that job creation, as important as it is, is not enough. Congress cannot allow lowest-common-denominator jobs—unsafe, low-pay, no-benefit jobs—to be the norm.

Our outdated laws put working people at risk every day. We have to fight for good jobs, jobs that can support a family, that can’t be outsourced. And jobs that families don’t have to worry will take their loved ones.

America’s workers are the best in the world. They deserve working conditions without avoidable hazards to their health and safety. Too many employers – poster children like Massey Energy and BP – put production and profits ahead of worker safety, costing workers their lives, limbs and health. Workplace protection laws enacted more than 40 years ago and critical agencies like the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) have reduced workplace deaths and injuries significantly. But they are weak and out of date.

Currently, the criminal penalties are harsher for harassing a wild burro on federal land than for killing a worker on the job. Last year, the median civil penalty in OSHA fatality cases was just $5,000, not even a slap on the wrist for most employers.

Legislation is moving through Congress now that would strengthen the Mine Safety and Health Act and the Occupational Safety and Health Act to provide stronger workplace safety enforcement tools and protect workers’ rights.

The Robert C. Byrd Miner Safety and Health Act of 2010 would strengthen the Mine Act for repeat offenders and those with a pattern of violations. It would give MSHA subpoena power in investigations and the authority to seek injunctions to stop hazardous practices while strengthening anti-discrimination provisions. It would also improve protections for workers at dangerous workplaces through stronger penalties and whistleblower protection. Simply put, this legislation would finally put teeth into workplace health and safety enforcement, and we call on Congressman Collin Peterson and the rest of Minnesota’s congressional delegation to support it.

Not surprisingly, corporate trade associations oppose this worker safety bill, claiming that current laws are adequate and stronger requirements will be too costly. The fact is this law will only apply to employers who violate the law and put workers in danger, and is targeted at the most serious violators. Companies that care about job safety and comply with the law should fully support it.

To tackle our jobs crisis, health and safety must not be pushed aside. It is a critical piece of rebuilding our economy.

And we should remember that restoring the freedom of workers to organize unions is also an important piece of ensuring workplace safety, because there is no greater protection than empowered workers, on the job every day, looking out for each other.

The nation has mourned the loss of the Massey miners, the BP oil rig workers, the Tesoro Refinery workers and others who have lost their lives on the job. This Labor Day, let’s honor them by passing significant reform for the future. Without action, these kinds of tragedies and unnecessary deaths are certain to continue. Congress needs to step up to protect the lives of the nation’s miners and workers and act now to pass this bill.

Richard Trumka is president of the 11.5 millionmember AFL-CIO. Shar Knutson is president of the Minnesota AFL-CIO, a state labor federation representing 300,000 working Minnesotans.