Good for you, but that requires an unusually enlightened employer. There were some people who managed to arrange safe jobs in the pre-OHSA days. Doesn't mean government intervention wasn't necessary.
The "government" doesn't exist independently of the people (even when it fails to represent them equally, either through unequal interest or unequal capacity to exert influence.) It is a mechanism through which the people "stand up for themselves to get" things that they want.
Any kind of government is a beast that feeds on the fears of the weak and the abilities of the strong. Pretending that it is simply a machine that produces an output based on the input signal of the voters is disingenuous.
So instead they get their bully friend to force others to comply with their wishes.