A comparison of the safety criteria of two widely accepted standards, i.e. the IEEE Std 80 and the IEC 479-1 is proposed. The two standards differ in their definitions of permissible body current and body resistance. Another difference is that the IEC 479-1 does not provide guidance on human feet/soil contact impedances. It tacitly assumes that these impedances are computable by the designer. A comprehensive study of permissible touch and step voltages by these two standards is included for a wide range of conditions, which enables a direct comparison of the two standards. It is shown that differences exist and these differences are quantified.