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I'm not sure I understand the point here. Is it that strict government regulation saves lives? If so, yes I suppose that could be true. Fewer people would die

• brown9-2 16y ago
  I'm not sure that this article has much of a point beyond what is on the surface, or that it is necessarily making an argument for or against regulation based on economic principles. The article's sole goal seems to be to help explain how a country with a large history of Earthquake experience has learned from it's history, and how the lessons and how they applied to their building structure helps explain how they might be able to deal with an 8.9 magnitude earthquake much better and with greater loss of life than if this earthquake had struck somewhere else. I don't think there is a secret meaning in every New York Times article.
  • solson 16y ago
    So all the people voting for this title on Reddit and Hacker News aren't making any statement on strict government regulation, they merely find it interesting that the Japanese have learned from their history?
    • gloob 16y ago
      Perhaps I'm misreading you, but you seem to be fishing for a specific answer. Is that the case? If so, why?
      • solson 16y ago
        Yes, it just seems apparent to me (like an earlier commenter grouk said) that the underlying point of the article and the discussion around it appears to be about competing ideas of libertarian vs. interventionist market principles. I was asking my last question to see who agreed. I guess not too many people, or I was unclear with my question. (edit) And I was frustrated with the implication made that a person who may think this is a conspiracy theorist that finds hidden meanings in every New York Times article.
        • brown9-2 16y ago
          My apologies if my last comment read that way - I did not mean to lump you in with conspiracy theorists. I often see people trying to read between the lines in NYT articles, not just in regards to current events and political viewpoints but even in the Styles or Weekend section (perhaps I read too many NYC-focused blogs).
        • gnaritas 16y ago
          > Yes, it just seems apparent to me that the underlying point of the article and the discussion around it appears to be about competing ideas of libertarian vs. interventionist market principles. You see what you want to see, even when it's not there. It's not very objective to assume there's a political agenda behind everything.
    • brown9-2 16y ago
      I have no idea why other people are voting the way they are; this is impossible to answer. Honestly I could not care less why other people are up-voting it. I find this story interesting both on an engineering level and as something news-worthy to explain how Japan may have been able to avoid a far greater tragedy.
    • jarek 16y ago
      So here's why I'm upvoting it: because I feel it is important and worthwhile to underscore the role of good engineering in human safety.
• drzaiusapelord 16y ago
  Decent building codes don't necessarily stop economic growth. Housing is slightly more expensive and it takes more capital to build, but its really not 2 or 10x the price of an unsafe home. Heck, some safer designs are cheaper than unsafe designs. I don't really buy the "safety is cost prohibitive" argument much. Modern societies have no problem absorbing the cost. Not to mention the cost of post-earthquake cleanup is less.
  • billswift 16y ago
    The bigger problem from a libertarian point is that regulation does not necessarily result in better safety. A lot of it simply results in higher costs, and redistribution of money to "licensed professionals". As an earlier commenter pointed out, many insurance companies actually require greater degrees of safety in buildings they insure than building codes do.
    • drzaiusapelord 16y ago
      I'm not seeing how bureaucracy and "licensed professionals" hired from the for-profit insurance industry to maintain their codes is better than doing the same in government. In fact, I would argue that the government alternative is superior as it doesn't involved the overhead of making a profit and growing markets (see socialized healthcare vs private healthcare). Unfortunately, its popular now in the USA to dismiss public safety as being less important than profits and to praise horribly unsafe countries run by dictators for their "growth." Not to mention, the intangibles here with the libertarian approach - massive brain drain to safer countries, lower quality of life, lower lifespans, etc. I'd rather be taxed out the wazoo in Germany than be tax-free in Somalia. I'd rather be in an earthquake in the USA or Japan than in China or Libya.
      • WalterBright 16y ago
        Somalia is the antithesis of a libertarian country.
        • 16y ago
• cap10morgan 16y ago
  That's a lot of hand-wavy claims. Care to back some of it up with data? Especially the part about China's economic growth being slower if they'd had stricter building codes. Absent any real data, it's equally intuitive to say that it wouldn't have been slower because [insert natural disaster here] would have been a big setback as often as [same natural disaster] occurs on average. Plus, you know, lots of people would have died who could have been saved by stricter building codes. I'd rather be alive than have a couple more percentage points of economic growth every year.
  • RickHull 16y ago
    > I'd rather be alive than have a couple more percentage points of economic growth every year. That seems rather disingenuous to me. The real question is: would you pay more up front to reduce the risk of a catastrophe? When the government mandates, you don't get to answer. It's a downside.
    • weavejester 16y ago
      > When the government mandates, you don't get to answer. It's a downside. It's also an upside, as it avoids a social trap[1]. If companies can choose what they want, those that spend less will have a short-term advantage over those that spend more. If the government mandates a certain level of quality, then there's no competitive advantage to cutting corners (assuming the regulations are well enforced). [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_trap http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_trap
• rubashov 16y ago
  > Japan's poor economic growth during over the last 10-20 years. Per capita GDP growth in Japan over the last 20 years has been about the same as in the USA. They just don't import two million people a year -- rather wisely in my opinion.
  • weavejester 16y ago
    > They just don't import two million people a year -- rather wisely in my opinion I don't think the USA and Japan are really comparable in the amount of immigration they can support.
    • angus77 16y ago
      There are proposals to increase immigration in Japan to offset the projected population decrease due to low birth rate. It's expected to drop by over 50 million people before stabilizing without increased immigration.
    • rubashov 16y ago
      Well what's the point of letting large numbers of people in if it fails to make those already here better off? And that's pretty clearly the case. That there's space to accommodate them is irrelevant. Also, considering issues like fresh water and food security, the country is in fact full. Japan maybe super-overfull, but the US is definitely full or overpopulated.
      • weavejester 16y ago
        > Well what's the point of letting large numbers of people in if it fails to make those already here better off? So in your view, it doesn't matter if the immigrants themselves are better off? > Also, considering issues like fresh water and food security, the country is in fact full. No it isn't. The EU has 820,000 km2 of arable land and 1,900 km3 of renewable water resources, and is self-sufficient in terms of food and water for a population of 490 million. The US, on the other hand, has 1,650,000 km2 of arable land and 3,000 km3 of renewable water, and only has a population of 310 million. The US could easily support a population of 500 million or more without needing to import water or food.
• stretchwithme 16y ago
  Yes, risk is always balanced against potential gain. And yes, the individual is the one who ultimately pays the price. So he should make the choices. But I believe that even in a completely free market, there would be a lot of local voluntary contractual arrangements that would regulate many aspects of very small communities and building codes are certainly one thing people would consider when making such an arrangement. As long as communities are competitive and contracts cannot be changed arbitrarily, this is not a problem. And if such contracts were not beneficial, these arrangements would lose to more sensible ones. So, I'm not too concerned about what local governments do. Overall I think it maps to what we'd have in a free market, except where cities get too big and corruption becomes a problem. One could easily argue that there is a worse safety/cost effectiveness tradeoff when you have to pay for corruption. Certainly when the average person is poorer than they would otherwise be, safety is harder to afford. The important thing is competition and if you can drive 4 minutes in the opposite direction and get the community you want, competition exists.
  • stretchwithme 16y ago
    Just as there is competition in automobile safety, there should be competition in community safety. Yes, there are national regulations, but I would argue that most cars exceed those regulation and brag about their 5-star crash ratings. Such would also be the case for communities designed by the Mercedes' and Toyotas of the community regulation business, should such brands be permitted to evolve.
• brudgers 16y ago
  From an economic standpoint, what modern building codes allow is the stable commercial insurance market necessary for a great deal of economic activity. In the US, many current construction requirements are based standards developed by the insurance industry, e.g. UL (Underwrither's Laboratories) and FM (Factory Mutual). And although it is now one of the foremost authorities regarding life-safety in the world, the NFPA (National Fire Protection Association) was originally a creation of the insurance industry as well. Modern building codes underpin property the property insurance which makes real-estate lending practical. They underpin much of the general liability insurance required for contemporary commercial transactions - not to mention making construction loans practical.
• bluedanieru 16y ago
  This is rubbish. First of all Japan's economic circumstances of the past 10-20 years are generally much exaggerated in the media, both Western and Japanese. And building codes, of all things, have almost nothing to do with that growth positively or negatively. Japan is one of the most earthquake-prone regions in the world, so we make sure that buildings are always built to withstand them to the maximum reasonable extent. That's the why the destruction from this massive earthquake is actually so light, considering. Perhaps we could leave things to the magic of the free market, but either that would work, in which case we'd be right where we are now anyway, or it wouldn't, in which case we currently be totally fucked. Japanese, not having the luxury of dealing with this issue in the abstract from the comfort of their apartment in New York, prefer not to take the risk. Also there is less belief in magic here than in the States. By way of comparison though, let's imagine the fate of New York and rest of the eastern seaboard of the US were a similar quake to hit there. I think you would not fare so well, and I suspect the low cost of your Chevy Impala would give you little comfort.
  • bluedanieru 16y ago
    Honestly, I'm trying to remain reasonable here, but are people seriously upvoting a post where a guy comes out and says that Japan would be better off without strict standards in place for buildings to withstand earthquakes, 24 hours after one of the most massive earthquakes in recorded history struck off the coast of the Japan and those very standards saves countless lives and billions in damage? How many lunatics do we have on this board, anyway?
    • rubashov 16y ago
      White and East Asian countries can afford building codes. Indonesians and Africans cannot. That's the missing point here. In the context of 2nd/3rd world nations the point about strict codes being unfordable is reasonable.
  • rubashov 16y ago
    > there is less belief in magic here than in the States. Not quite so sure about that. Japan has spent trillions on idiotic keynesian construction stimulus for over 15 years. Only one round of that has Americans up in arms.
• wazoox 16y ago
  > The problem is we'd be way less productive and we'd be much poorer. There is no proof that the current ridiculous state of the matter, where everyone in the US constantly moves oneself together with 3 tons of steel for 2 to 3 hours a day is particularly productive either. If mobility was somewhat less easy, maybe we'd find another productivity hilltop which could be higher than the current one. In fact, we'll have to find such an alternative, less mobile way of life sooner of later.