The Last Mile Shouldn’t Cost a Worker a Lifetime: Making Package Delivery Safer

A package arriving at the front door can feel almost effortless. Someone else has lifted it, carried it through traffic, found the address, and crossed whatever path separates a vehicle from a doorstep. For the worker, that final stretch can involve stairs, poor lighting, loose mats, heavy or awkward parcels, traffic, weather, and pressure to keep moving.

A personal injury can make that hidden work visible. A fall on a step, for example, can turn an ordinary route into weeks of pain, missed work, and dependence on family. But the larger question is not whether one worker was careful enough. It is whether the system around delivery makes a safe pace and a safe handoff possible.

The risks behind a convenient service

The available evidence does not describe one single “delivery worker.” It covers several groups, including employees of courier companies, postal workers, local messengers, and people working in related warehouse and transportation jobs. The categories are imperfect, but they point in the same direction: the last mile has real, measurable risks.

The Government Accountability Office reported in October 2024 that last-mile delivery workers had one of the highest estimated rates of serious injury among private-sector industries in its analysis of 2022 data. Serious-injury rates for last-mile delivery rose 23% from 2018 to 2022. The three largest categories were overexertion, contact with objects or equipment, and falls, slips, and trips. Together, those categories accounted for about 91% of serious injuries among last-mile workers in the GAO’s analysis. 1

The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ 2024 industry table offers a related signal. Couriers and messengers recorded 8.0 total recordable cases of nonfatal occupational injury and illness per 100 full-time workers. Local messengers and local delivery recorded 8.5 cases. These are employer-reported industry rates, not an individual worker’s odds of injury, but they show why delivery work deserves attention. 2

Why “just be careful” is not enough

Personal attention matters, but it cannot solve hazards created by job design. A worker may see a step and still misjudge it while carrying a parcel, looking for an address, or working in poor light. Repeated lifting can become risky when packages are heavy, irregular, or placed at ground level. A route that is manageable at a quiet pace can become unsafe when performance targets leave little time to inspect a walkway or recover from fatigue.

NIOSH defines ergonomics as designing work tasks and job demands to fit workers’ capabilities. It identifies lifting, pushing, pulling, carrying, awkward postures, repetition, vibration, cold, and psychosocial stressors as factors that can cause or worsen musculoskeletal disorders. In plain terms, safety is partly a matter of changing the work, not merely telling a person to tolerate it better. 3

That approach can include better hand trucks, more manageable parcel loads, training that reflects real routes, route planning that accounts for stairs and weather, and time estimates that do not reward rushing. It can also mean giving workers a practical way to report hazards without fearing that a lower delivery count will be treated as poor performance.

The case for speed—and its limits

Delivery companies and customers have legitimate interests in efficiency. People may depend on timely deliveries for work, school, household needs, or accessibility. Companies operate on narrow margins and coordinate large networks of vehicles, warehouses, contractors, and customers. A rule that adds time to every stop can increase costs and may make service less available or less affordable.

Those concerns should be part of the policy conversation. Safety improvements are not free, and a small operator may not have the same resources as a national carrier. Nor does every delay prove that a company is acting irresponsibly.

But speed has a limit when it shifts predictable costs onto workers. A missed delivery window is inconvenient. A broken bone, chronic back injury, or crash can affect a person’s income, family responsibilities, and future ability to work. The right comparison is not “fast delivery versus no delivery.” It is whether modest changes—realistic route times, safer equipment, staffing for peak periods, and usable reporting systems—can prevent injuries without eliminating a service people value.

The GAO found that OSHA cited warehouses and last-mile delivery employers for more than 2,500 workplace violations during fiscal years 2018 through 2023. It also found that OSHA staff reported challenges identifying ergonomic hazards, including limited training and unclear guidance. That suggests enforcement and expertise matter alongside company policies. 1

OSHA’s trucking-industry guidance explains that workplace protections and employer responsibilities can apply at warehouses, docks, delivery locations, and other workplaces where goods are picked up or delivered. It also points to the need for hazard-specific information and training. The exact legal duties depend on the work arrangement and setting; workers should not assume that a general online summary answers a specific legal question. 4

What safer delivery could look like

Employers can start by measuring more than completed stops. Near-miss reports, repeated injuries, route hazards, and time spent on difficult deliveries can reveal problems before they become serious. A worker who reports a slippery path or a dangerous staircase should help trigger a solution, not a penalty.

Equipment and parcel handling deserve equal attention. Assistive devices are useful only when they fit the route, are maintained, and do not create new obstacles. Packages can be organized to reduce awkward reaching. Work areas can be lit and kept clear. These changes are practical applications of ergonomics, not luxuries reserved for factories.

Customers and property managers also have a role. Clearing snow and clutter, securing loose mats, keeping steps visible, repairing handrails, and turning on exterior lights can make a routine delivery less hazardous. A customer cannot redesign a company’s route algorithm, but a safe approach to the door is a meaningful public contribution.

Policymakers can improve the evidence. Researchers need data that distinguish walking, loading, driving, stair use, lifting, and other tasks while protecting workers’ privacy. Better data would help agencies and employers direct resources to the hazards that cause the most harm. It would also make it easier to compare employee and contractor arrangements without assuming they carry identical risks.

A more honest definition of convenience

Convenience is not the absence of effort. It is the transfer of effort. When a parcel appears at a doorstep, someone has absorbed the physical work and the uncertainty of the route. Recognizing that fact does not require blaming customers or treating every company as the same. It requires asking whether the system rewards safe work or quietly rewards workers for taking chances.

The answer should be visible in ordinary design choices: a reasonable route, a usable hand truck, a clear walkway, enough time to pause, and a workplace where reporting a hazard is treated as prevention rather than failure. Those choices may not make delivery instant. They can make it less likely that an ordinary day ends with a worker unable to lift an arm, drive home, or care for a family.

A safer last mile is therefore not only a labor issue. It is a test of what a community counts as an acceptable cost for convenience.