Worker compensation laws make sure that employees are covered by insurance that will provide them with financial support if they are hurt or disabled while working. This eliminates the need for injured workers to sue their employers. The dependents of workers who are hurt or killed in work related accidents or illnesses can also receive benefits. Before workers’ compensation laws the only recourse injured workers had was to sue their employers, a long and costly procedure. Congress passed the Workman’s Compensation Act in 1908. (The word workman was used because the law was meant to cover accidents or injuries that happened in industrial settings, where the employees were almost entirely men.) After this move by the federal government, individual states began to enact their own worker compensation laws.