<p>Nice point about short lived companies, BB. ;)</p>
<p>I do have to comment on this, though, “The biggest difference between academia and industry is that it looks like academia is allowed to “police” itself when it comes to safety:”</p>
<p>I know at my school we have the local fire department come through looking for safety violations, and they have the ability to fine us for any violation they catch (which they are quite happy to do, since they can make pretty decent money off of it). We also get walk-throughs by a federal agency (I forget if it’s OSHA or EPA or someone else) that can fine us for safety violations, environmental violations (leaving bottles of solvents uncapped), etc. I imagine since pretty much all grad students in the sciences are funded, OSHA would be involved in those labs.</p>
<p>I’ve actually had some issues with my school’s attitude on safety recently, as the university leaves it up to the individual divisions to set safety guidelines. For example, in the Chemical & Chemical Engineering division, it’s mandatory to always wear safety glasses. For this reason, they will pay for prescription safety glasses for anyone that wears prescription lenses (similarly with them providing lab coats). In my division, they make the argument that since not every lab requires safety glasses or lab coats, they shouldn’t have to pay for them. This then makes the burden fall on individual advisors who tend to be a bit less generous with paying for safety equipment.</p>