There are over 2.8 million nonfatal workplace accidents and injuries reported by private industry employers in the US each year (USA.Gov), but how unsafe is it really to work in the US compared to other countries around the world?
Researchers analyzed data from around the world, looking at the number of fatal injuries that have happened within the workplace in each country, alongside the work-life balance of each country, the average cost of health insurance policies and how peaceful each country is by using data from Vision of Humanity, to reveal the safest countries around the world to work in.
Denmark, the Netherlands and Hungary are found to be the three safest countries in the world to work in, with the United States considered the second most unsafe country to work in. Below, we reveal where other countries placed.
When researching which country is the safest to work in, we gathered data from countries around the world to reveal the following:
The United States is found to be the 2nd most unsafe country to work in, when looking at the number of fatalities in the workplace, alongside the average hours worked by employees and other factors.
When it comes to workplace fatalities, the US reported 6,632 fatal accidents to the International Labour Organization. In fact, the United States has reported the highest number of fatal injuries to the ILO. On top of this, the US has the highest cost for health insurance policies, coming in at an average of $11,942 per health insurance policy, per year, per person.
Following the US, Japan has the second most fatal injuries in the workplace (1,628 fatal injuries reported), followed by Mexico (1,427 fatal injuries reported).
Iceland (4 fatal injuries reported), Mauritius (5 fatal injuries reported) and Cyprus (8 fatal injuries reported) have reported the least amount of workplace injuries across the globe.
Switzerland and the Netherlands have been found to have the best work-life balance. When looking at research from the OECD Better Life Index on the percentage of employees per country who work on average more than 50 hours a week, the US comes in at 22nd place even though an average working week in the US is 40 hours as standard, closely followed by the United Kingdom who have an average working week of 37.5 hours as standard.
We found that the average cost of a health insurance policy is the most expensive in the United States, costing on average $11,942 per policy, per year. Hungary, on the other hand, has the cheapest policies, averaging $2,582 per year.
As part of our research methodology, we factored in how safe it is to work in each country, so we looked at the Global Peace Index, produced by the Institute for Economics and Peace. Denmark, the country that was found to be the safest to work in, comes out near the top of the Global Peace Index leader board, with a score of 1.296.
Below is our ranking of the safest countries in the world to work in:
| Ranking | country |
| 1 | Denmark |
| 2 | Netherlands |
| 3 | Hungary |
| 4 | Norway |
| 5 | Sweden |
| 6 | Portugal |
| 7 | Germany |
| 8 | Slovakia |
| 9 | Finland |
| 10 | Poland |
Below is our ranking of the least safe countries in the world to work in:
| Ranking | country |
| 1 | Mexico |
| 2 | United States of America |
| 3 | Israel |
| 4 | Russia |
| 5 | Brazil |
| 6 | Turkey |
| 7 | Chile |
| 8 | South Africa |
| 9 | United Kingdom |
| 10 | France |
Here is the full leader board of our findings (safest to least safe):
| Ranking | country |
| 1 | Denmark |
| 2 | Netherlands |
| 3 | Hungary |
| 4 | Norway |
| 5 | Sweden |
| 6 | Portugal |
| 7 | Germany |
| 8 | Slovakia |
| 9 | Finland |
| 10 | Poland |
| 11 | Czech Republic |
| 12 | Ireland |
| 13 | Austria |
| 14 | Switzerland |
| 15 | New Zealand |
| 16 | Greece |
| 17 | Spain |
| 18 | Australia |
| 19 | Japan |
| 20 | Canada |
| 21 | France |
| 22 | United Kingdom |
| 23 | South Africa |
| 24 | Chile |
| 25 | Turkey |
| 26 | Brazil |
| 27 | Russia |
| 28 | Israel |
| 29 | United States of America |
| 30 | Mexico |
To create the ranking of the safest countries around the world to work in, data was collected from Vision of Humanity, OECD Better Life Index, International Labour Organization and Pacific Prime.
We looked at the rankings for each country and discounted any countries from our index which the data wasn’t provided for through the cited sources. Only countries that are represented in the Vision of Humanity data, OECD Better Life Index data, International Labour Organization data and Pacific Prime data were included in the final rankings.