Riddle v. Workers' Compensation Appeal Board (Allegheny City Electric, Inc.), 603 Pa. 74

Summary

The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held that, under Section 306(b)(2) of the Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Act, an employer seeking to modify benefits for an injured employee who resides outside Pennsylvania must focus its earning power assessment on the usual employment area where the injury occurred. Because the employer’s assessment focused on Wheeling, West Virginia, rather than Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the court reversed the Commonwealth Court and denied the employer’s petition for modification or suspension of benefits.

Holdings

1. Under Section 306(b)(2), when an injured employee does not live in Pennsylvania, the employer must focus its job-availability analysis on the usual employment area where the injury occurred. The employer may not enlarge the search to other areas based on its own view of the employee's economic or vocational ties.
2. The employer's earning power assessment was insufficient to justify modification of benefits because it focused on Wheeling, West Virginia, and other markets rather than Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where the injury occurred, and identified no jobs in Pittsburgh.
3. The majority stated that the 1996 amendment to Section 306(b) replaced the prior Kachinski approach for claims involving injuries suffered after the amendment's effective date, although it did not hold that satisfying Kachinski could never also satisfy Section 306(b).

Questions Presented

1. Under Section 306(b)(2) of the Pennsylvania Workers' Compensation Act, may an employer establish an out-of-state employee's earning power through an earning power assessment focused on the employee's residence rather than the Pennsylvania location where the injury occurred?
2. Was the employer's earning power assessment legally sufficient to justify modification of Riddle's workers' compensation benefits?

Disposition

reversed