4 ms·

It isn't obvious that is a case. Some companies make bad short-term decisions. But many take a longer-term view. Who would hire the construction company again t

It isn't obvious that is a case. Some companies make bad short-term decisions. But many take a longer-term view. Who would hire the construction company again that made the bad bridge? Or consider food and drug regulation. Countries with more lax requirements for proof of drug efficacy and large-scale trails don't have worse health outcomes. In fact, the countries with stricter policy regimes are often slower to have receive life-saving drugs. Does the suppression of a drug with adverse effects that only shows up in a wider population or after more prolonged exposure have a stronger benefit than that the suppression of drugs without such downsides? Often countries optimize in the wrong direction here. Many licensing laws fall in this category too. Do barbers and hair stylists need a license? Probably not to ensure safety and we have plenty of comparable jurisdictions with and without such rules to prove it. People don't just start doing bad things in the absence of rules.

chopin 9y ago
Construction companies circumvent this by going bankrupt all the time and setting up the next shell company. Big projects will often be done by a pool of companies. Which would you hold accountable then. As well, some things are so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact.
- aeorgnoieang 9y ago
  > Construction companies circumvent this by going bankrupt all the time and setting up the next shell company. This would be a much more difficult thing for them to do if it was easy to track the history of bad behavior of the relevant people. This seems like something that should be relatively easy to do nowadays, module some probably not-too-significant obstacles like the 'right to be forgotten'. > Big projects will often be done by a pool of companies. Which would you hold accountable then. In the absence of detailed information, one would reasonably hold them all partially accountable. > As well, some things are so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact. There's no perfect way to do this. Murder seems like it's "so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact" but I don't think either of us would want to live in a society that was perfectly capable of preventing any murders.

chopin 9y ago

Construction companies circumvent this by going bankrupt all the time and setting up the next shell company. Big projects will often be done by a pool of companies. Which would you hold accountable then. As well, some things are so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact.

aeorgnoieang 9y ago
> Construction companies circumvent this by going bankrupt all the time and setting up the next shell company. This would be a much more difficult thing for them to do if it was easy to track the history of bad behavior of the relevant people. This seems like something that should be relatively easy to do nowadays, module some probably not-too-significant obstacles like the 'right to be forgotten'. > Big projects will often be done by a pool of companies. Which would you hold accountable then. In the absence of detailed information, one would reasonably hold them all partially accountable. > As well, some things are so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact. There's no perfect way to do this. Murder seems like it's "so bad that you don't want to punish after the fact" but I don't think either of us would want to live in a society that was perfectly capable of preventing any murders.