Rutecki v. First Liberty Ins. Corp. [06/16/16] 2016 MTWCC 6 Although the vocational rehabilitation counselor created job analyses for positions in Helena and the claimant had moved to Kalispell, this Court concluded that a viable labor market for those positions existed in the claimant’s labor market where the counselor credibly testified that equivalent positions were readily available in the Kalispell area.

Short v. J.H. Kelly Holdings, [09/24/09] 2009 MTWCC 33 The Court must employ a fact-driven analysis in determining a petitioner’s appropriate labor market for purposes of developing alternative job analyses pursuant to § 39-71-609, MCA. In this case the Court considered a number of factors to conclude that Shoreline, Washington, is the appropriate labor market including: (1) the petitioner permanently resided in Shoreline, Washington, from 1998 through the time of his injury in 2005; (2) the petitioner accepted millwright jobs throughout the Pacific Northwest, but returned to Shoreline as his residential base between 2003 and the time of his injury; (3) the petitioner worked in Montana only on a temporary basis, returned to Shoreline after his injury and testified that he would have stayed there for his recovery had he been able to locate a treating physician in the area; and (3) the petitioner moved from Shoreline to Clark Fork, Idaho, because he knew other millwrights living there and envisioned working as a millwright again after recovering from his injury.

Skiff v. Montana State Fund [03/06/09] 2009 MTWCC 8 Although the claimant was working in Havre at the time of his industrial accident, he resides in Malta and the evidence demonstrated that for the vast majority of his employment history, he worked in or very near Malta and had given notice to his employer that he was leaving the Havre job to take a job closer to home. The claimant’s labor market is therefore in or near Malta.