4 ms·

> I think the reason contracts aren't readable to laypeople is because laypeople aren't the intended audience. This doesn't make sense. The parties to the cont

by pdonis 4y ago

> I think the reason contracts aren't readable to laypeople is because laypeople aren't the intended audience. This doesn't make sense. The parties to the contract are presumably laypeople, and they have to understand it before they agree to it and sign it since one of the legal requirements for a valid contract is a meeting of the minds, meaning a common understanding between the parties of what each of them is agreeing to.

johndhi 4y ago
While the parties are usually laypeople, the drafters and readers of significance are almost always lawyers. If you decide to try to bring a claim against your mortgage lender, will you have a lawyer read your mortgage agreement before you file suit? Surely.
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  Then what hope is there for a layperson to do anything of significance without first having a lawyer vet the EULA? Such agreements are already absurdly long for some of the most trivial services or products. The answer cannot become "be a lawyer or rich enough to afford retaining one".
  - BurningFrog 4y ago
    There is no such hope, and that is the answer. Much of this country is set up by and for lawyers, and that has consequences.
    - johndhi 4y ago
      Agree. There is generally little hope of a layperson (or even a lawyer typically) of benefitting from a EULA. That said, laws separate from the contract might benefit you - if Microsoft's software kills your dog, you probably can't recover under the contract, but you might be able to win a lawsuit against them for breaking the law. Unfortunately that process is also costly and benefits greatly from lawyer involvement. It's a widely known problem that it's expensive to navigate the court system.
  - pdonis 4y ago
    > Then what hope is there for a layperson to do anything of significance without first having a lawyer vet the EULA? I think this focuses attention on the wrong thing. A counterparty that is acting in good faith will not put absurdly long legalese in a contract, because if they are acting in good faith, it is in their interest to reach a genuine meeting of the minds with you, because fulfilling the contract will benefit both of you. So the first question to ask is, is your counterparty acting in good faith? Are they genuinely trying to reach a win-win agreement with you, where both sides benefit? Or are they just trying to get whatever they can out of you, by hook or by crook, without caring whether you benefit? If the answer to that is the latter, your best option is to avoid dealing with that counterparty at all. If a counterparty is not acting in good faith, no amount of legal analysis of contract language can protect you. (And that is why I avoid using products and services that have those absurdly long EULAs whenever possible.) And if a counterparty is acting in good faith, you should be able to reach agreement on reasonably simple contract language that a lay person can understand.
    - zaphar 4y ago
      By this reasoning the vast majority of lawyers drafting contracts are not acting in good faith because the vast majority of lawyers are drafting obtuse unreadable contracts. Which is perhaps the case but the current reality is that encountering readable contracts is the exception not the common case.
      - pdonis 4y ago
        > By this reasoning the vast majority of lawyers drafting contracts are not acting in good faith because the vast majority of lawyers are drafting obtuse unreadable contracts More precisely, the clients the lawyers are representing aren't acting in good faith because they are fine with their lawyers doing that. As your next remark suggests, this is indeed the current reality: legal instruments like contracts are not used to enable win-win agreements that create wealth, but as tools of predation. That's not how it's supposed to be, but it is, unfortunately, often how it is.
- pdonis 4y ago
  > While the parties are usually laypeople, the drafters and readers of significance are almost always lawyers. I disagree. First, many contracts are not drafted by lawyers. Mortgage notes, which you mention, usually are; but, for example, a real estate sales contract in most states is standard boilerplate language that was drafted by realtors, not lawyers. Second, saying that lawyers have to read the contract if a dispute goes to court doesn't mean lawyers "almost always" are the readers of significance, since most contracts never result in a dispute that goes to court. If a dispute goes to court, then of course it is prudent to hire a lawyer to represent your interests. But if contract language has done its job properly, there will never be a dispute that needs to go to court, because both parties--lay people--will have had a common understanding of what the contract says and will act in good faith to fulfill it.
brnaftr361 4y ago
IANAL, How would you prove that? I think there are protected classes for that reason, but if some adult outside of such classifications signs they could ostensibly renege at any point under the pretense that they didn't understand, conversely I presume it would necessitate attorneys (or similar) at every contract signing to ensure it would be binding.
- johndhi 4y ago
  Your question is exactly the reason why meeting of the minds doesn't solve this problem. It's subjective. Fyi in practice, signing the document means that you understand it, as far as a court is concerned. Contracts will often throw in boiler plate like "I am authorized to sign this, I've read it, and I understand and agree to it." The most common way it's successfully challenged is "incompetence" - by showing the person who signed it in no way could have possibly understood it (e.g. developmentally disabled, someone held a gun to their head, don't speak the language and the translation was fraudulent, etc).
- pdonis 4y ago
  > How would you prove that? You don't. Once you sign a written contract, the presumption is that there was a successful meeting of the minds between the parties. If you later want to claim that you didn't have a meeting of the minds with the other party, the burden of proof is on you to show that. The other party does not have to prove that you did understand the contract.
  - AstralStorm 4y ago
    The problem is that many of the contacts are shrink wrapped - there's no way for you to modify the contract and rejection outright is not free.
    - pdonis 4y ago
      What do you mean by "rejection outright is not free"? If you don't have the option to decline to participate, it's not a contract.

by pdonis 4y ago

johndhi 4y ago

While the parties are usually laypeople, the drafters and readers of significance are almost always lawyers. If you decide to try to bring a claim against your mortgage lender, will you have a lawyer read your mortgage agreement before you file suit? Surely.

paulryanrogers 4y ago
Then what hope is there for a layperson to do anything of significance without first having a lawyer vet the EULA? Such agreements are already absurdly long for some of the most trivial services or products. The answer cannot become "be a lawyer or rich enough to afford retaining one".
- BurningFrog 4y ago
  There is no such hope, and that is the answer. Much of this country is set up by and for lawyers, and that has consequences.
  - johndhi 4y ago
    Agree. There is generally little hope of a layperson (or even a lawyer typically) of benefitting from a EULA. That said, laws separate from the contract might benefit you - if Microsoft's software kills your dog, you probably can't recover under the contract, but you might be able to win a lawsuit against them for breaking the law. Unfortunately that process is also costly and benefits greatly from lawyer involvement. It's a widely known problem that it's expensive to navigate the court system.
- pdonis 4y ago
  > Then what hope is there for a layperson to do anything of significance without first having a lawyer vet the EULA? I think this focuses attention on the wrong thing. A counterparty that is acting in good faith will not put absurdly long legalese in a contract, because if they are acting in good faith, it is in their interest to reach a genuine meeting of the minds with you, because fulfilling the contract will benefit both of you. So the first question to ask is, is your counterparty acting in good faith? Are they genuinely trying to reach a win-win agreement with you, where both sides benefit? Or are they just trying to get whatever they can out of you, by hook or by crook, without caring whether you benefit? If the answer to that is the latter, your best option is to avoid dealing with that counterparty at all. If a counterparty is not acting in good faith, no amount of legal analysis of contract language can protect you. (And that is why I avoid using products and services that have those absurdly long EULAs whenever possible.) And if a counterparty is acting in good faith, you should be able to reach agreement on reasonably simple contract language that a lay person can understand.
  - zaphar 4y ago
    By this reasoning the vast majority of lawyers drafting contracts are not acting in good faith because the vast majority of lawyers are drafting obtuse unreadable contracts. Which is perhaps the case but the current reality is that encountering readable contracts is the exception not the common case.
    - pdonis 4y ago
      > By this reasoning the vast majority of lawyers drafting contracts are not acting in good faith because the vast majority of lawyers are drafting obtuse unreadable contracts More precisely, the clients the lawyers are representing aren't acting in good faith because they are fine with their lawyers doing that. As your next remark suggests, this is indeed the current reality: legal instruments like contracts are not used to enable win-win agreements that create wealth, but as tools of predation. That's not how it's supposed to be, but it is, unfortunately, often how it is.
pdonis 4y ago
> While the parties are usually laypeople, the drafters and readers of significance are almost always lawyers. I disagree. First, many contracts are not drafted by lawyers. Mortgage notes, which you mention, usually are; but, for example, a real estate sales contract in most states is standard boilerplate language that was drafted by realtors, not lawyers. Second, saying that lawyers have to read the contract if a dispute goes to court doesn't mean lawyers "almost always" are the readers of significance, since most contracts never result in a dispute that goes to court. If a dispute goes to court, then of course it is prudent to hire a lawyer to represent your interests. But if contract language has done its job properly, there will never be a dispute that needs to go to court, because both parties--lay people--will have had a common understanding of what the contract says and will act in good faith to fulfill it.

brnaftr361 4y ago

IANAL, How would you prove that? I think there are protected classes for that reason, but if some adult outside of such classifications signs they could ostensibly renege at any point under the pretense that they didn't understand, conversely I presume it would necessitate attorneys (or similar) at every contract signing to ensure it would be binding.

johndhi 4y ago
Your question is exactly the reason why meeting of the minds doesn't solve this problem. It's subjective. Fyi in practice, signing the document means that you understand it, as far as a court is concerned. Contracts will often throw in boiler plate like "I am authorized to sign this, I've read it, and I understand and agree to it." The most common way it's successfully challenged is "incompetence" - by showing the person who signed it in no way could have possibly understood it (e.g. developmentally disabled, someone held a gun to their head, don't speak the language and the translation was fraudulent, etc).
pdonis 4y ago
> How would you prove that? You don't. Once you sign a written contract, the presumption is that there was a successful meeting of the minds between the parties. If you later want to claim that you didn't have a meeting of the minds with the other party, the burden of proof is on you to show that. The other party does not have to prove that you did understand the contract.
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  The problem is that many of the contacts are shrink wrapped - there's no way for you to modify the contract and rejection outright is not free.
  - pdonis 4y ago
    What do you mean by "rejection outright is not free"? If you don't have the option to decline to participate, it's not a contract.